Hometown: South London.
The lineup: Alice Merida Richards (vocals, synths, sampler) Sam Pillay (guitar, synths, sampler), Sebastian Truskolaski (drums).
The background: Virginia Wing make pop music, but the sort that rarely becomes popular – at least, not Carly Rae Jepsen popular. That’s because it’s wrapped in swirls and drones, swathed in studio shadows and fog. They sound like a pop group tethered by avant-garde tendencies, or possibly like an avant-garde group enlivened by pop tendencies. They remind me a bit of the one shoegaze band yet to reform, Lush: there’s something in the female singer’s clipped delivery that recalls Miki Berenyi and Emma Anderson of that early-90s shoegaze girl group (featuring two men). The other outfits Virginia Wing bring to mind are Stereolab and Broadcast – acts who managed to sound experimental and current, yet haunted by a pop past that you couldn’t quite fix; who sounded at once quaintly English and dreamily Europhile. This three-piece from south London’s vocalist sings in a defiantly British way, but there is a Francophile mystery and an airiness to her tone that is resolutely Scandinavian.
Their debut album, Measures of Joy, recorded at London’s Holy Mountain Studios by Misha Hering, has been out for a couple of months, but it is being reissued in May in a deluxe vinyl version. It is a good opportunity to discover the band, or to reassess them if you already got there before us. It is an amalgam of Radiophonic musique concrète, krautrock propulsion, cinematic atmosphere, brooding electronics and serene melodies. The Body Is a Clear Place is typical, with its decelerated, dirge-like girl-group pop. The titles – Estuary; In the Mirror – evoke all manner of implicit unpleasantness and allude to the anxiety and dread and quiet horror beneath the surface of everyday life. On Juniper, Merida Richards goes behind the looking glass to find something disturbing. “Trust in your medicine,” she intones like a malevolent nurse.
Throughout, the band hint at sweetness, but it’s only on bonus track Donna’s Gift, all chintzy, queasy fairground organ and creepy prettiness, that they go all out and produce a pop hit – even if it’s for a top 40 on that parallel planet where Factory and Sarah Records were bigger than Stax or Motown. At such times, the joy the band creates is immeasurable.
The buzz: “Lush, experimental sophisti-pop that seeks to create a genre all its own” – Pop Matters.
The truth: Experimental yet accessible indie-pop for all the family.
Most likely to: Hit to death in the future head.
Least likely to: Have a hit.
What to buy: The deluxe vinyl version of Measures of Joy is released on 18 May.
File next to: Broadcast, Stereolab, Propaganda, Life.
Link: facebook.com/virginiawingband.
Ones to watch: Ben Khan, Ji Nilsson, LA Priest, Planes, Wil$on.
