In the blurb that came with this album, the fantastically named Legends of the Seven Golden Vampires (also the name of a film that is part Dracula, part The Water Margin) stated that, with their debut long-player, many critics found the band’s constant genre-hopping not to their taste. I was going to ask, “What’s wrong with these people?” but I know the answer: journalists and gatekeepers and influencers and commentators generally like things to be neatly tied up, pigeonholed, labelled and regimented; it makes their life easier; they don’t have to think too much. Thankfully, with The Pumphouse of Broken Dreams, the band seems not to have taken any notice of such comments.
I suppose something like psychedelic pop songs might be a good place to start, but even with this as a broad reference point, the band quickly go far beyond such a simple tag. ‘To Think, To Heal.’ opens things not with a bang but with a mellifluous musical murmur, a gentle collection of sweet and seductive sonics that dreamily drift across a soundscape that balances ambience and gentle energy. Gorgeous and gorgeously unexpected.
‘Come Home’ is more up and at ‘em pop, psychedelic and shimmering, paisely-patterned rock guitars drifting through more commercial realms, their cover of ‘Hopelessly Devoted To You’ pushes the Olivia Newton-John classic chart cut slowly into acid rock realms, ‘In My Dreams’ is the sound of dance, and dream pop and trip-hop all moving as one and ‘BLEND’ is a clubland ‘banger’ (as I believe the kids call them) that feels like the purposefully (il)logical conclusion to an album built on the element of surprise, if gently so.
After reading that suggestion that the band may have kicked off down a too-eclectic route with the first album, I was expecting something more diverse; maybe they heeded the critics’ concerns (something you should never do, after all, if we knew how to make great music, we wouldn’t be in the back bedroom writing about other people’s efforts), maybe this was just the natural direction of travel.
Either way, The Pumphouse of Broken Dreams is a wonderful experience, creatively varied but not to the point of dislocation, fantastically accessible, though appealing to the more discerning music fan too, and a brilliant music journey that takes you places you least expect and then makes you wonder why no one has taken you to such sonic beauty spots before!
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