The Twilight Sad - Forget the Night Ahead

The second full length offering from the Twilight Sad sees them, if anything, darker and more unsettled than on Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters or the intervening EP's. Titles like I Became a Prostitute, The Neighbours Can't Breathe are testament to that. So too are the snatched lyrics - 'There's people downstairs', 'You're the bearer of a womb without love', ' They put up no fight.. we'll bury them all' - all lay down an underpinning but still opaque sense of threat and foreboding.

All sounds pretty gloomy stuff but there is something I can't stop listening to here. James Graham's vocals are in a heavy Glaswegian brogue that adds an urgency and directness to the already oddly threatening lyrics, Andy MacFarlanes sundry noises, accordion and signature guitar sound (reminiscent of the Kitchens of Distinction sound) are under scored by the bass lines and squelchy drum sounds from Craig Orzel and Mark Devine. Given the uncompromisingly miserabilist lyrics you do feel that a night out with Mr Graham might be quite a depressing affair.

Although so far it seems to be the early tracks of the album that have burned their way into the memory - especially I Became a Prostitute and Seven Years of Letters, I am sure that the later tracks will inveigle their way in, perhaps That Birthday Present for example (that really does sound like a very grumpy and miserable Kitchens of Distinction somehow)

Well really surely the clutch of Scottish bands must be complete now? Twilight Sad, Frightened Rabbit, We Were Promised Jetpacks and There Will be Fireworks - to a man all with enigmatic band names. Worth a mention too that on the day of this new Twilight Sad album comes the official release of those other Scottish heroes Idlewild's latest and self released album, Post Electric Blues

Twilight Sad website

Twilight Sad Myspace

Idlewild website

Idelwild Myspace

Kitchens of Distinction Myspace

Stephen Hero/Kitchens of Distinction website

Kitchens of Distinction

I have long harboured a fondness for KOD and especially the 1990 album Strange New World. I really don't l know why they didn't make it much bigger than they did, but their 10 year stint ran out in 1996.

They were genuinely ahead of their time (how often do you hear that?) but the swirling wash of guitars and vocal style wasn't to see its like again until the advent of Interpol and more especially Editors, who took up the baton - whats that, almost 10 years after the demise of KOD.

A post on the blog Ryan's Smashing Life reminded me of KOD again and helpfully gave a couple of jumping off points to follow, first through Braggin Billys Music Blog and then to the site of Patrick Fitzgerald the former singer/bass player and songsmith of KOD. Mr Fitzgerald now trades under the monicker Stephenhero ( James Joyce character I think?) and has been producing more music for the theatre and stage and again largely as a solo artist. From his site you can download a free EP that contains a couple of tracks not put on his recent CD '57 Stars of the Air Almanac' (no, I have no idea what that means but it reads well)

There are also a few, now slightly bizarre, but welcome vids on YouTube that bring back those jangly days of the early 1990's including the brilliant 'Quick as Rainbows'...



Stephenhero Myspace
KOD Myspace
KOD Youtube