Red – Guillemots

There are a few rare golden moments in your life when one particular record makes you feel like nothing ever has before or ever will again. When an album raises in you such a full range of emotions that everyday life seems greyer as a result. When a song manages to encapsulate your exact feelings at that time in such a way, it’s as if the music is resounding at a frequency that was created by God (or the Gods or Fate or whatever) just for you.

 

This all sounds rather hyperbolic I realise, but Guillemots’ debut album Through The Windowpane had such a deep impact on me that I feel it’s deserving. Although I had immediately fallen in love with the glorious euphoria of their singles, the full album was more a grower. After several months of occasional listening I came back to Through The Windowpane and wondered what I had been missing before. If anything had thrown me it’s that debut albums just aren’t supposed to sound like that. They don’t begin with a bold, radio-unfriendly orchestral ballad, run through a gambit of unique and yet accessible songs, and finish with an eleven-minute epic masterpiece of melodic madness. It was like nothing else I’d heard and yet almost everything I could want from an album was there in those twelve songs.

 

What compounded my adoration was my situation at the time. I had made the decision to travel the world, saying goodbye, for a while, to my girlfriend, family and friends. I was on an exciting adventure but alone in the world, happy to be there but facing constant trepidation. And something in those songs seemed to speak to me, empathise with me, console me and reassure me. The album deals with love, loss, fear, departure and travel to new places. My circumstances put me in the perfect place to receive each line that magically flowed from Fyfe Dangerfield’s lips. Too many nights to count, I fell asleep with his beautiful voice ringing around my head, thinking of those I had left behind. At times I was terrified I had made the wrong decision but that music was my constant, faithful companion.

 

Of course with such great love comes the fear that it may end. Or, when you’re talking about music at least, that this kind of reaction might not be reproduced in the future. However Guillemots are not a band who were ever going to stand still or to try to recreate something they have already succeeded so admirably in doing. It’s no surprise then that Red has been criticised by some in the mainstream press for making inroads into genres far removed from their original brand of orchestral pop. Much has been made of the contemporary RnB influences with names like Prince, Timbaland and even, err, Girls Aloud trotted out at regular occurrences, and much of this comment has been fair and even useful. ‘Big Dog’ is the most obvious stopping point with its booty shakin’ rhythms, falsetto vocal turns and sharp production. There’s also ‘Last Kiss,’ the first album track with lead vocals provided by the band’s double-bassist Aristazabal Hawkes. Arista’s soft feminine vocals introduce an entirely new quality to Guillemots’ sound, and though it would at first be easy to dismiss it as something of a filler track, a closer listen reveals it as something more serious and one of the band’s most dancefloor-oriented songs to date. In fact it’s fair to say that Guillemots don’t have any filler tracks; indeed one of the most fantastic things about this band is that you know they never do anything without giving it their all and that they’ll have debated into the small hours before putting each song to bed. Even if the results aren’t 100 percent successful from a listener’s point of view, it’s certainly never down to want of trying on the group’s part.

 

   ‘Get Over It’ – Guillemots

 

 

Despite the supposed emphasis on RnB style pop, Red by no means stops there and there’s so much more to these tracks than any kind of Justin Timberlake take off. At a recent live performance, the band produced a heavier, more guitar-based sound than I’d ever heard them perform before, with even ‘Big Dog’ featuring more rock and roll debauchery than anything you might expect to be compared with Timbaland. (For more on that gig take a look at my review for Gigwise: here). Equally a soulful sound creeps into other songs on the record (although not for the first time). ‘Falling Out of Reach’ is a clear example, beginning as an acoustic ballad and building to the sound of a lush choir. The hook on this song is gorgeous but there’s something about those backing voices that seems overdone – not over the top as such, just a little out of place and unconvincing.

 

My other criticism of ‘Falling’ takes me to the one area of Guillemots’ songwriting that has ever really irked me: the lyrics. Fyfe himself has admitted he’s not the most eloquent of writers and it’s hardly surprising to hear him say on this album that “life would be so much easier if they had no words”. Though his captivating, if abstract, imagery is largely a sufficient partner to the music (and I can even put up with “Big heart/Big hug/Big dog/That’s what I want), when you have a melody as enchanting as the chorus of ‘Falling’ there’s something simply unsatisfying about effectively hearing the same line repeated three times. It’s as if you know there should be other words there instead, better words, and they’re on the tip of your tongue but they just won’t come out. Sometimes, as with all good authors, all good musicians need a good editor. Someone to throw their lyric sheet at them and shout ‘Get out and don’t come back ‘til you’ve written something decent!’ ‘Falling Out of Reach’ is a song which offers an awful lot, but which should give so much more. Having said that, Red covers a lot of lyrical ground, extending the themes of the first album to include frustration (sexual and otherwise), hopelessness and escapism. For a record so full of upbeat sounds it’s actually pretty dark.

 

Returning to the music, there are plenty of other directions in which Red pulls the listener, from the overwhelming and menacing opening notes of ‘Kriss Kross,’ to the electronic beats of ‘Don’t Look Down.’ Non-specific Middle/Far Eastern sounds are also thrown around liberally in several places, sometimes without a strong purpose. This culminates in ‘Cockateels’, which is probably the most overproduced thing the band have ever done and arguably far too shiny for its own good (and it’s not the only song on the album you could say that about). Still, all the songs have an inherent beauty that makes it difficult for me not to lose myself in their sonic multiplicity.

 

Despite all this experimentation, Red by no means makes a clean break with the past and some of the shimmering pop of the band’s debut makes a strong appearance, as with the glistening  ‘Standing on the Last Star,’ dreamy closer ‘Take Me Home, and the sweet, if initially unmemorable ‘Words,’ which features Norwegian indie singer Ida Maria. The most familiar element throughout the album is Fyfe’s delicious and emotive voice and the gorgeous melodies that emanate from within him. There is something so comforting about his vocals, like an old friend returning home, and this is true even when the arrangements push the songs into new territory as with the bleepy ‘Clarion’. (I wasn’t that surprised to learn that the song was actually written by Fyfe in 2003 before Guillemots’ formation and has been given new life in this version.)

 

With so many different threads running through the album, the all-important question is does it all hold together? At first, the answer appears to be no and the first few tracks seem to veer wildly in all manner of directions as if the band had so many ideas rattling around they had to get them out as quickly as possible in case their collective heads explode. But things settle down and seem more cohesive as the album progresses and, on top of this, the more I listen to the album the more I begin to see how it all fits together. Once the initial shock has subsided it no longer seems like such a bumpy ride, less like a random collection of genre bending songs and more like a thoughtful statement of musical expression. The production, which can seem brash and overdone at first, gradually reveals itself to have plenty of light and shade, although it never loses its polished edges.

 

In spite of their fierce attempt to craft a big pop record, Guillemots’ lack of chart success is not that surprising: they remain too weird for the mainstream market and too slick for the alternative market. And because they’re not four skinny guys with guitars and Converse trainers, they won’t make it with the NME kids. Press reaction has varied wildly and, as Red’s rapid slide from number nine to well outside of the top 40 shows, ultimately Guillemots remain something of a niche act: brilliant to some, unworthy of such praise to others and downright repellent to a few. Even though I am well aware of the flaws that would enrage some listeners, I am placed squarely in that first bracket. I can see why many would be put off by Guillemots’ sentimental tunes and words, their vocal acrobatics, and their seemingly desperate attempts to have a bash at every genre in the musical catalouge, but I just love these songs too much to care. I can’t justly compare Red with its predecessor for that record means too much to me for a fair fight, but with their second album Guillemots have surprised not disappointed me and the more I listen, the more I discover. The band remain determined to push ideas and do so without losing those things that made them special in the first place. Their musical experimentation has always been a little self-conscious, but their weirdness has always been matched by their effortless command of melody. Even if they forcefully seek out unusual sounds, it has only ever, in my opinion, added to their abilities to create perfect pop records. With Guillemots, all the arguments in the world couldn’t stop this music from taking over my emotions. And that’s what truly great pop music is: something that has the ability to make you feel better, or feel worse, or just want to dance around, and sometimes all of the above at the same time.