Thursday 12 February 2009

Black Sea, Fennesz


1. Black Sea
2. Colour Of Three
3. Perfume For Winter
4. Grey Scale
5. Glide
6. Glass Ceiling
7. Saffron Revolution

Perhaps it’s Seasonal Affective Disorder, but I can’t remember another album that so sums up the almost endless dark of day and nights in winter months. If Endless Summer did indeed reflect the 70s childhood feel of endless summers, then Black Sea reflects the long, cold marble of winter.

But this music isn’t cold, its warm hazy feedback of guitars and electronics clothe you in a sound that’ll keep you warm on the darkest of days. Opening with the title track and then going straight into Colour of Three we get nearly 20 minutes of epic drone, fuzz, hum, static and feedback – the sound merging for me with the noise of the District and Circle lines (you should really only listen to this album through headphones – it’s a very private thing).

Glide, recorded with artist Rosy Parlane, is the albums track par excellence – an absolutely beautiful, emotional cloudburst of noise. Sculpted from the mass of clouds that create the dense layers of Black Sea, it should be the national anthem for winter gods. Yes I really did just write that last sentence – well you try and write about Fennesz – it’s like trying to explain a Rothko on the radio.

The album closes with Saffron Revolution – an immense, almost choral drone of noise and shredded guitar, leaving the sense of beautiful chaos lingering in your head long after it goes.