The first impression of these effusively loud Scottish rockers make is they sound like Mogwai covering speeded-up Sigur Rós songs with a few kidnapped members of Broken Social Scene directing the whole effort. However, The Twilight Sad goes way beyond that. Here, It Never Snowed. Afterwards, It Did.—an EP—features four re-worked numbers from the band’s first full-length, last year’s Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters, as well as two other songs.
There’s an explosiveness lingering in the background with the band’s sound on this record; you can definitely tell that they’re toning things down. But like the inevitable buildup before the breakdown in a metal or hardcore song, The Twilight Sad’s shimmering tremolos grow increasingly louder before crescendoing into full-scale orchestral beauty—with all kinds of instruments (was that a glockenspiel?).
The track “Cold Days from the Birdhouse” showcases, above all else, singer James Graham’s bold voice: he wavers out lines like, “And your red sky at night won’t follow me … it won’t follow me now,” with a thick Scottish brogue, until he’s practically screaming. Graham’s voice is backed by an immense, doom-laden wall of noise giving the impression that this band would probably be awesome live.
This four-piece gives off a dark, lonely, distant vibe, and they seem to write songs about adolescence instead of adulthood—really the pith of a person’s developing emotional life. In that way, like punk rock, it’s good stuff. And while that distant vibe pervades, the group’s sweeping, orchestral delivery hints at the possibility of hope instead of simply sadness. Totally epic.
– Brendan Dabkowski
The Twilight Sad on MySpace: www.myspace.com/thetwilightsad
Fatcat Records: www.fat-cat.co.uk/fatcat