Martes 19 May 2009, 23:32

http://www.chemikal.co.uk/images/checkmate-savage.jpg
For the Weekly Album Appreciation Club

Checkmate Savage is the full length debut of The Phantom Band. An album about details, idiosyncrasies and those little quirks that make a band separate themselves from the pack.

This album could lead you down any number of roads, each one different than the other. From noisy synths, hooky pop melodies and krautrock tendencies, passing through a cappella harmonies to a folksy campfire sing-along. Most songs stand out on their own, not linked to its predecessor, feeling more like a collection of thoughts than a well mapped straight road. I personally think that's what makes this album a memorable experience and the most remarkable moments are those that come a bit out of nowhere.

Songs like album opener The Howling showcases their most straightforward, rich and melodic moments accompanied by the wonderfully deep voice of their lead singer, known under the nickname “Richard The Turd”. Strange, I know.

Burial Sounds emerges to sound like a dark ritualistic modern anthem, full of chants, textured distortion and deep percussion. Never losing focus or accessibility, and giving you quiet climaxes in between the surging melodies and vocal harmonies. Folk Song Oblivion lightens the way a bit with a looser use of the "folk song". With a lot more canned energy for you to make the best use of it as you see fit. It starts off with a threatening tone and a hushed group vocals that breaks loose into a more melody based way that simply makes you want to clap along, or shake an imaginary tambourine. "You've got a voice so loud, you break the mountain side".

Crocodile sweeps in with a duality between a bouncy melody and a melancholic, and solitary, guitar that struggles not to get lost lost in between deep bass-lines and croaking samples. Until the guitar surges in and gives the song a whole different side to it.

For a moment, we ride back into a more pop approach with Halfhound and the darker Left Hand Wave. Both crafted in such a textured way that would please most "headphones music" aficionados. Island sees the band swing for the epic folk fences, with a melancholic, distortion free, ballad that almost clocks in the 9 minute mark. This is where the campfire sing-along comes in, in case you are lost, with a full ensemble of banjo and what sounds to me like a saw(?) Sort of sneaks in on you, you can't help but think this is the "safe card" in the bunch.

Throwing Bones picks up the pace once again, until it breaks out a doo-be-doo vocal group, that is. This either makes you go "wtf" or crack a smile and join in on the doo-be-doo, maybe both. This is obviously the work of a band that is not taking themselves too seriously.

For the closing curtain call they threw us in The Whole Is On My Side that comes in like a mix between "Left Hand Wave" and "Crocodile", with a repeated slow paced melody flavored in with various distorted samples and buried somber tones that flip into a more easygoing vibe halfway through the 8 minutes. "I know I have been foolish, I was only trying to behave like a man" in a voice full of sorrow and doubt. Maybe this is right, maybe it isn't.