Her Only Presence – You’re Never Back

Any band that can have “I Wonder If There Will Ever Be A Boy Who Can Swim Faster Than A Shark” as the title of a song is going to succeed; even if that success is only qualified by me on my own standing and shouting and waving my arms like a crackpot. Thankfully the song on Her Only Presence’s new album “You’re Never Back” lives up to such a glorious title, with its contrasting poppy, jerky, rocky introduction and laid back shoe gaze verses, into its solid instrumental outtro section that ends in ever increasing lumps of reverb. It probably wouldn’t make a single release due to its unconventional structure, but it really is delightful.

“Bathrooms” is bouncy and lively, treading a wonderful fine line between pop and indie-rock, with its jangly mix of electric and acoustic guitars and understated chorus, which is memorable without ever being obviously hooky. At times the vocals are perhaps too quiet, but thankfully the clean guitar lines are so interesting and well thought out, the voice ceases to become the focal point and just a part of the overall melody. If we lived in a normal world where bands had singles and albums that ordinary people heard on their radio, this track would be the single and it would be adored the world over.

The album is a mix of dreamy, floaty songs like “The Owl”, “Words”, “Clear Eyes, Full Hearts” (with its superb backwards guitars) and “That Girl You Know, The Writer”, and sections of hard, distorted rocking like at the end of “Your Light” and on the opening track “Goodnight”. It never truly rocks hard mainly due to the lead vocalist Luis Cifre, whose voice is soft and high, almost to the point of falsetto. Occasionally there is a comparison with Sigur Ros, both in the vocal arrangement and the song structure, as some of the tracks are mainly instrumental, “A Present” for example: but unlike the Icelandic band, Her Only Presence manage to cram a full symphony into two minutes 19 seconds. Stunning.

Hailing from the city of Barcelona, Her Only Presence should give our own homegrown bands something to think about. They are creating original music, that drips with the sweat and emotion it clearly has been made with: the attention focused on what is most important, the music, and not on fashionable haircuts and skinny jeans. Come on England, wake up from your Oasis hangover, let’s start making albums as beautiful and creative as Her Only Presence, before the Spanish not only overtake us in international football, but in music as well.

(Kudos must be given here to Engineer Records (engineerrecords) who have already brought potential albums of the year to my attention.)

Her Only Presence – You’re Never Back is out now on Engineer Records

Review by Alan Neilson

http://gettothefront.co.uk/2011/08/album-her-only-presenc

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HER ONLY PRESENCE – You’re Never Back CD

Well, from the sleevenotes, it’s obvious that this trio are from Spain. But when you listen to it, you’re convinced that you’re listening to something that sounds like a shoegazing melange of Coldplay and Sigur Ros in a guitar universe where everything is taken at slow or mid-paced flow, where vocals are an emotional afterthought, grafted on to a river of guitar work that’s delicate, gentle, ambient, ringing, soaring, shining and bright.
The rhythm section are so much in evidence simply on the grounds that they have that rare ability of making something so overtly slow, sound so incredibly hypnotic. With songs and vast acres of instrumental work that cruise, flow, fly and build to a head of steam that most other bands would regard as restrained, the absolutely amazing part about all this, is that it’s stunning!

The vocals are distant yet present, upfront yet somehow unobtrusive at the same time. The songs have a knack of grabbing you right from the start then taking you on some kind of journey along which you hang on every note, chord and beat, while that sea of warm, soft, emotive vocals whispers, drives and flies overhead to total perfection.

It’s an album that fulfills your desire to listen to something moody while at the same time something to sink your teeth into, music that’s strong yet beautiful, solid yet warm, emotional but intricate, full of attention to detail yet coming out as a whole that is truly expansive. IN short, it’s brilliant – the sort of album you’ll keep coming back to without ever really knowing why.

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The cover shows how complementary the cult album of MINERAL, a tract of land and CoBolt, CAMBER PENFOLDS, are on the influence list.

It’s great that there is still something, because this fragile emocore, beyond Tough-guy clichés is beautiful and so right as with HER ONLY PRESENCE I heard the sound of not long ago. Produced the current album by the way Chris Crisci, who was already in THE APPLESEED CAST. An absolute work of niche, but it is really great album. Thomas Eberhardt (7)

http://www.wltu-music.de/julele

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Her Only Presence are a Spanish power-trio from the beautiful city of Barcelona.

The bands music is much like The Scene Aesthetic. The band’s new album ‘You’re Never Back’ starts off with the song ‘Goodnight’ which has the lyric wise of the band hawthorne heights, whilst just having a slow and steady move about it, the album sounds like its based on personal feelings about someone or something that they have either lost or are willing to gain.

In my opinion if you want to listen to a band that’s soothing & will make you feel all calm say from a rough days work, this is a band that should be on your top playlist, just before bands like Pink Floyd’s dark side of the moon album & The Scene Aesthetic’s EP ‘A Type & A Shadow’.

Although the band has still a lot to work on, as on the album the singer needs to be a little louder, as in some of the song’s you cannot understand what he is saying, I would tip these guys to at least have a mainland european tour, with the view of a few UK dates if they get asked to support someone.

Song to download: Words

GARETH DUTTON

2/5 Top Hats.

http://www.tophatmagazine.com/Reviews/Her-Only-Presence-Y

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