Villagers
The Art Of Pretending To Swim
Domino Records
Listening to the new Villagers album The Art Of Pretending To Swim, Irelandโs Conor OโBrienโs absolutely adorable voice once again stands out. This time OโBrien has written nine new songs using more or less the same formula as the previous three studio albums. Why change something that really works and brings so much joy and redemption to the listener? If you havenโt already become acquainted with Villagers, this is a brilliant place to start. But once you have listened to the album, you better hurry down to 2015โs Darling Arithmetic. That album is Villagers in its purest form. The Art Of Pretending To Swim is a good album though, it reaches further back than Darling Arithmetic, back to the first two albums, where the sounds were a little more complex. This time OโBrien is adding a dance beat and a touch of both analog and digital sonic details to that sound. Everything on the album is, by the way, played by OโBrien himself, with a little help from strings and horns.
The album begins with three really strong songs: โAgainโ, โA Trick of the Lightโ and โSweet Saviourโ. โAgainโ adds some edge to OโBriens voice in the repeated slightly distorted word โAgainโ, that runs throughout the song, and like the album, the song has something to do with faith and God: โI’ve found again (Again)/A space in my heart again (Again)/For God again (Again)/In the form of art again (Again)โ. โA Trick of the Lightโ follows with a slightly RโnโB feeling and a grooving bassline and again thereโs the question of faith. โIf thereโs a sign in the sky tonightโ, OโBrien insists that โno one’s gonna tell me it’s a trick of the lightโ. No, for him, thereโs more to it than just that. Knowing about his religiousness, it is God that delivers the signs. โSweet Saviourโ is a lovely melody with a broken-up drumbeat and a great keyboard figure, the swooning lyrics becomes a little too much in this song though. The album closes with two lazy and quiet songs, the almost supersonic โHold Me Downโ and the lovely โAdaโ.
Artistย Links
SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: VILLAGERS – THE ART OF PRETENDING TO SWIM
Jens Trapp