Featuring a collective of Scottish musicians – François and The Atlas Mountains, Findo Gask and Lauren Mayberry from Chvrches – Gerard Black’s debut is an understated, unclassifiable album of incongruous compositions; chintzy synths, tropicália percussion, jazz guitars, pillowy vocals and underlying surrealism. Black lists Armando Iannucci as an inspiration, and while the spirit of satire is perhaps an indirect influence, there are traces of flouncy silliness throughout, not to mention Orange Juice, Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, Badly Drawn Boy and the whacky bend of Tilt, which borrows its bassline from Prefab Sprout. More recent purveyors of wonky pop Everything Everything and Wild Beasts are evident, too – and as with the latter, its songs are virile, verdant, instruments coursing through the soundscape like a plant’s roots ripping through the earth. However, instead of a band writing these songs, there is a singularity to Black’s sound that benefits this album, a consistency of uncompromised character that is as odd as it is charming.
