THE APRIL MAZE – Sleeping Storm (Self-Released A-MAZE006)

Sleeping StormHaving made their UK debut last year with an amalgam of their first two albums, Anglo-Australian husband and wife duo Sivan Agam and Todd Mayhew return with this all new (save for ‘Don’t Let The Bastards Bring You Down’, a former tribal stomp rhythm single that appeared on the compilation) collection of 13 tracks, their cello, banjo, guitar and keyboard playing augmented by drums, bass and the occasional shot of trumpet. There’s no covers this time round, though the influence of the West Coast sounds of the late 60s and early 70s remains, augmented with nods to English folk rock of the same period, notably so on ‘Homeland’, which surely owes a debt to Denny era Fairport, while there’s more of a rock influence apparent on ‘Fire’ and ‘Inside Out’ and ‘So Many Songs’ finds Agam adopting a sort of Lily Allen delivery, albeit accompanied by plucked and bowed cello.

There’s a vaguely apocalyptic tone to some of the songs, references to storms to be found in the skipping rhythms of an otherwise melancholic ‘I’ve Seen The Rain’ (dedicated to a friend who died at sea), the close harmony memories running through ‘Spark’s and, obviously, the hushed ‘Sleeping Storm’ with its lines about wounded soldiers. But their imagery also embraces rain, the sun , wind and fire for different effects, the latter conjuring enduring passion in the banjo-accompanied autobiographical love song duet ‘Scout Hall’, and danger in ‘Fire’, the allegorical, tragedy of the Lion Man, a musician in a band, his volatile brother Iron Jaw, the girl who played violin and a game of cards.

Thoughts of home and the road are there too, the former on the scraped cello of ‘Fantasy’ (the melody of which, perverse as it may seem, sounds like a sort of folk restyling of ‘Material Girl’) which also embraces a recurring theme of facing and overcoming fears, while the latter is at the heart of the delightfully titled ‘It’s Been So Long Between Beers’, a nice and very Australian lyrical twist on the usual life of the gigging musician number.

Environmental concerns rumble too, especially so on the strings backed anti-fracking protest ‘Leave It In The Ground’, a number that, although he still largely provides counterpoint harmony with Agam handling most of the lead vocals, shows Mayhew’s voice to have gained in strength and confidence, an observation reinforced with the colonial shanty stomp and clap ‘The Bishop Who Ate His Boots’, the true story of his great-grandfather, Isaac Stringer, a bishop in the Yukon, who got lost in a snow storm during a tour of his diocese with fellow missionary Charles Johnson and, as documented in the book of the same name, ran out of food on their 60 mile trek back over the mountains and survived 51 days living off the boiled seal skin of their spare shoes. They’ve been likened to a combination of the Mumfords, Florence and the Machine and First Aid Kit with a cello, but, listening to this, you’ll agree they have a uniqueness that is very much all their own.

Mike Davies


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