I have been sat with the latest offering ‘Kaleide‘ by the quirky Leeds based mob Sky Larkin for bout 6 weeks now. I’ve listened to it countless times and although the band broadly fit in the “Indie Pop” bracket, I feel there is a little more going on here and so deservedly warrants a little more attention.
To this reviewers ears, we have quite the spectrum of influence seeping through the 3 pieces relatively humble “Guitar, Bass, Drums” approach to theaforementioned Indie Pop bucket. It sounds like a guitar led Mates of State on sherbert, via a warbly splash of primus and tripping daisy, fastforwarded through a valve driven telecaster, all spit polished with an early 90s sub pop wax. Oh and some hand claps!
The record kicks off with the undeniably catchy single ‘Still Windmills’ which has hankerings towards a Wombats-esque melody, wrapped up in spiky guitars and driving drums and bass. In fact, the majority of the record keeps up the resoundingly happy & positive driving vibe, but with a few curve balls thrown in to keep things interesting.
The warbly dirt of the title track has a real head bobbing groove to it with another killer hook, whereas the “negative creep lite” angular riffage of spooktacular keeps the listener wondering where this might all end up. Well wonder no more, the back end takes one through a few tracks with a more synth inflected angle which makes for another welcome change of tone.
Elsewhere ‘ATM‘ proves to be truly mesmerizing. Halfway through it slows right down for a few bars, then the guitar kicks in and the vocals pick back prompting a haze of head banging and toe tapping. After all the havoc you share the same head pounding that you do after mixing a bunch of red wines. And thats just one track.
Approaching the end the BBC remarks that with ‘Smarts‘ the band ‘hit their peak and arguably fulfil what they’re capable of for the first time in two albums‘. This Yeah Yeah Yeahs-esque number may well be the most considered track on the album and one you will be returning to frequently.
Despite pulling in all of these influences from around the way, Sky Larkin manage to pull it off with a confident, slightly erratic charm. Definitely worth checking out if you like the more original end of the Indie pop spectrum.
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Post by the insufferable Warren
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TRACKS:
Sky Larkin – Still Windmills
