On Cascade Lakes‘ first album, the sound has a kind of ragged heart beat to it, the opening track driven by bells and a steady rhythm, with a quavering guitar line and the sort of vocal delivery that brings to mind early Arcade Fire; the touch of melancholy in the chord structure, an evocative sweep of strings sitting quietly in the background.
Most of the songs are sung by guitarist Jan Schewe, his sharp, trebly sound working well with the deep, resonant bass. The English words are delivered in a classless European accent offer cool with a touch of remove, the dark and at times acerbic lyrics sitting a little at odds.
The voice can be a little more excitable on some tracks; there is a sense of tension on “Look Alive” and I like his sense of delivery. Words are not always rhymed and sometimes an extra word or two is jammed into a line, because that is where they need to go to force a point or the narrative dictates. It twists and turns, building and releasing tension in a shrill burst.On the whole, the trio is coming from an indie rock direction — but that doesn’t quite cut it as there is too much variety in the songwriting. There are plenty of twists and turns and tempo changes in “Code Red Lockdown”, but it doesn’t feel mannered in the way some post-rock bands sound. This is what the song requires to build the excitement. There are no obvious parallels. The tone of Jan’s voice at times reminds me of Stuart Murdoch of Belle And Sebastian, something about the purity of it and the personal imagery of some of the words: “Sit still and change your name, for all I care”; and there is a hint of ’90s US indie rock in the blowing guitar sound and sense of yearning.
Some vocal samples from a space shuttle launch give “Pi Equals” something intriguing to match the restless guita,r but the tone changes again for “Lunapark”, where bassist Fabio Papais is handed the mic. Each track feels like an antidote to the one before, with the same basic ingredients used to evoke different moods. Fabio’s voice is deeper and more lugubrious with a hint of Jonathan Richman, the words a little more wondrous and maybe a little less cynical, but still with an epic unfolding.The album signs off with the slow motion build of “Smoke And Mirrors”, rather a cutting indictment of a particular person: “No matter what you, it’s all a game to you, it’s true”. It sounds personal: “You’re not fooling anyone”, we are told the as the sparsely quiet guitar and mournful cello slow the whole album down. The mood has changed, and can only be altered by the slow build helped by the joining of the drums, this sad observation bursting into life with everybody throwing all they have until it rolls to a halt.
Cascade Lakes have come down the indie rock route with a fresh set of eyes, carving out new territory with this moving and tender work, fraught with aching hearts and stoicism, light and shade.-Mr Olivetti-
