Evi Vine

Give Your Heart To The Hawks

Written by: BW on 22/12/2014 23:40:10

Having a secret genre fetish is a good thing. There must be a style you like that you keep to yourself, or perhaps a band that only comes out in your own personal space, almost like a release from the norm that you pleasure your ears with on a normal basis. For me, it’s dreampop and slowcore stuff. Think Goldfrapp and Portishead and you get a rough idea. Rock lovers do seem to follow this pattern, as this brand of music accompanies it well. Evi Vine is someone who is up and coming and is beginning to build a reputation for herself in this field, and with her influences including Nine Inch Nails you become intrigued. How will her second album “Give Your Heart to the Hawks” help to enhance her showing on the world stage?

The first thing you notice as a constant theme throughout the album is that of emotional despair, but in a good way. The chords, instrument work and everything else therein produce a hair raising haunting style that wraps itself around your soul in an intense manner. The songs are all encased in minor keys, allowing electric and synth to batter your nerves like they have a God given right to. There seems to be leanings to Goldfrapp to me, but there is an even bigger move towards Massive Attack in terms of the creativity on show. The distortion in the tracks have an effect of mapping the song out and allowing you to take that path towards the enjoyment laid out for you. The title track does that all by itself, allowing some almost abused guitars throwing distorted cries for help enter your head as if you say that they are at peace if you listen intricately to them. Mix this with some saddening progression in the melody and Evi’s scintillating voice and you can begin to see exactly why people are paying attention to her.

The downside to this is that although this is a great strength to most of the songs on here, it can sometimes be a bit of a weakness. The fact that all of the songs seem to follow a similar pattern in their conception, this can also lead to a couple of the really slow and sparse songs feeling just a little empty. “Welcome The Dream Led Masses” does seem to take such a long time to spring out of the slumber its in that you feel that your interest has waned before it gets to the brink of snapping out of the deep sleep it has already put itself in. Ironically the song after it, “Starlight” is a completely different animal. The pace wraps round the singular underlying chord and almost keeps it snugly in place whilst the vocals and piano work enhance them. There are some clever bits in amongst it all, but these aren’t utilised anywhere near enough.

In terms of this album it isn’t just the music that conflicts the emotions, the actual songs seem to clash with each other and the result is a little strange on the ears. There are songs that link to your heart and feel like it could be your conscience talking to you and the music only heightens the feelings that go along with it. Other times you’ll be forgiven for assuming that the dead end is merely in the track and you spend more time scrunching your head up wondering where it’s going. “I’m Not Here” isn’t so much a song, as it is a musical call to The Samaritans. Again, much like “Welcome The Dream Led Masses” it takes a long time to wake itself that your interest seems to dissipate, which leaves the song without purpose in terms of either your enjoyment or emotional involvement.

The simple truth is that when this album works it really does whisk you away into a dark place filled with powerful emotion and you want to be moving along with it, but when the album doesn’t quite get it right you feel cold, and not in a good way. You almost get that feeling of being at a party and having that awkward moment where you don’t know anyone and have no idea what to do, it’s that disorientating. What the album does show though is good progression in the career of a young lady who shows massive (attack) signs of progress. “Porcelain” and “Love is Gone” are two of the strongest songs on here, but the title track is the standout and delivers that uppercut of intense emotion that this kind of music strongly needs. It is just a shame that some of the tracks just don’t match up to them. A little more alternating style wouldn’t have went amiss either, with a faster beat here or some more strings coming in to mix things up a little. There is goodness here, but there are bits that could improve. On the whole though, the album has a lot of emotion, soul in abundance and one of the most distinctive and pleasurable voices I have heard in many a moon.

7

Download: Porcelain, Love is Gone, Starlight, Give Your Heart to the Hawks
For The Fans Of: Massive Attack, Goldfrapp, Portishead, The Fauns, Snowbird
Listen: facebook.com

Release date 20.02.2015
Solemn Wave Records

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