The Horrors
Skying

Third effort for the HORRORS, "Skying" arrives two years after "Primary Colours," an album that distanced the band from the garage-punk atmospheres with 'noir' shades of their debut "Strange House," leading them to a less raw and more contemplative sound close to 'shoegaze' atmospheres; today the HORRORS mark a further evolution in their complex and articulated sound, embracing styles and various musical directions that draw from the 80s but without forgetting the lesson of many alternative bands from the subsequent decade.

Enclosed in a beautiful 4AD-style cover and released by XL Recordings, a label in full creative and commercial fervor thanks to artists like Adele, Radiohead, Vampire Weekend, Friendly Fires, and Sigur Ròs (the latter a recent acquisition of the label snatched from the major EMI), "Skying" showcases ten songs close to musical perfection in an effective and uniquely impactful sequence, revealing a not at all negligible versatility rarely found in productions of contemporary artists. Perhaps only Arcade Fire with "The Suburbs" have managed this in recent times.

The Horrors go almost beyond. And the initial triptych "Changing The Rain," "You Said," and "I Can See Through You," which indiscriminately cite the My Bloody Valentine and the Psychedelic Furs of the early albums without neglecting kraut-rock lessons brought back to the scene by the excellent Engineers of "Three Fact Fader" recently, can't help but leave the attentive listener in a state of "auditory orgasm." Two small psychedelic gems "Endless Blue" and "Dive In" pave the way for that magnificent and unparalleled single "Still Life": a true shoegaze mantra with its oscillating progression between suggestive layers of keyboards, feedback effects, electronic drums, and a vocal style balancing between a more educated Jim Morrison and an Ian McCulloch fresh from an alien encounter. "Wild Eyed" and "Moving Further Away" continue this excellent journey in electropop directions tinged with Teutonic rock and psychedelic digressions once again close to the noise-rock of My Bloody Valentine, Engineers, and also Can and Kraftwerk. They close with "Monica Gems," a visionary and hallucinatory sort of small tribute to the past of their first debut album, and "Oceans Burning," an almost homage to Pink Floyd in the "The Dark Side Of The Moon" era.

Ultimately, "Skying" is a sum of colorful musical influences spanning three decades of music without being an annoyingly derivative record but not excessively pretentious or self-referential either. Not a small feat for Faris Badwan, a young man of just 25 years and leader of this excellent English band, who also has behind him another notable 'side-project' called Cat's Eyes alongside Rachel Zeffira, an Italian-Canadian soprano and multi-instrumentalist, author of a self-titled album released just two months ago.