As the title track kicks off this small, but perfectly formed EP, I find myself thinking, “what might XTC have sounded like if they had embraced the gentler end of shoegaze,” such is the song’s blend of original guitar pop chops and shimmering waves of dreaminess. It would have been a glorious career move on their part (not that the one they took didn’t richly reward the discerning music fan). But the fact that they didn’t means that MatAre has made such a space his own.
It is interesting to read that one of the defining factors behind the EP’s sound was his efforts to create a sonically cohesive album consistent with his already impressive body of work. Whereas many would indulge their wilder flights of creativity, MatAre is aware that he is building something that has a shape and sound he can already picture in his mind.
And if finding new areas to explore within his pre-ordained sonic pastures might seem, to an outsider at least, a hard task, this quartet of new music sees him navigate those spaces effortlessly, not to mention elegantly.
“When Alone” blends pace and poise, a groover indeed but still balancing it with the grace that has always defined his work, and “Do You Think They’ll Talk About Us?” is a chimmering masterpiece, one that moves between sun-drenched shards and shimmers of guitar and brooding understament.
“When The Sun Falls” rounds us off, a song that could easily have graced a Bunnymen album, a cascade of chime and charm, guitars create gossamer soundscapes, which the beat and bass run headlong through, pausing or powering as the changing dynamics of the song dictate.
Part power-pop, part dream-pop… pop is the common denominator here, but it is pop that draws on the echoes of a past golden age for the genre and, like all his work, reminds us that pop can make cleverer choices, sound smarter, and be more rewarding if it only makes the choice to do so.
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