Post War Glamour Girls
Pink Fur

It might have been the fault of the somewhat erratic Padana summer but, between one thunderstorm and another while listening to “Pink Fur” by the “Post War Glamour Girls”, a very powerful lightning bolt must have struck my head, the kind that resets your brain for the worse or, fortunately in this case, for the better. How this album and this band reached my ears is anyone’s guess (disturbing memory lapse). Probably, among the hundreds of proposals that attack me daily, something clicked when I read the name of the English band: “Post War Glamour Girls”. Girls, irresistible charm, post-war, who knows who they are and what they do? Should I trust them? Should I give it a listen? Okay, I'll try. More than just one listen, I gave it at least three or four listens in a row, I threw in my head, then my heart and then another ten/fifteen listens. But where does their charm come from?

James Anthony Smith, James Thorpe, Alice Scott, and Ben Clyde play something different, they don’t cling to the bandwagons of temporary trends (psychedelic revival, shoegaze revival, “revival di sticazzi”, etc.), they produce a brilliant and electrifying blend. James Anthony Smith, singer, guitarist, and frontman of the group, eerily resembles the great and tormented Nick Cave of the '80s: big and deep voice, damned and arrogant just the right amount. The bassist Alice Scott Knox Gore often responds with an angelic, fluted, and sacred voice just the right amount. Ben Clyde on drums and James Thorpe on electric guitar build and deconstruct explosive, suspended, and oppressive situations, straddling between post-punk and lo-fi garage. The album flows smoothly between post-rock attitudes, brit-pop catchiness, and frantic non-stop rhythm changes. The dark, melancholic, tragic, and aggressive atmospheres alternate continuously in the ten tracks for 45 minutes of music that offer few references.

An astonishing and daring proposal, published in 2014 by the personal label of Iliketrains (http://www.ilikerecords.com/), the “Post War Glamour Girls” are and will remain, without a doubt, one of my best musical discoveries of 2014. The Leeds formation may in the future take one of the many paths trodden in this “pink fury”, aggressively sweet as only a few girls can be.

Let yourself be taken by the girls or the post-war, let yourself be taken by this magnetic album. Trust me.