Australia’s Steve Kilbey & Gareth Koch are back with another gem of a record. “Songs From Atlantis” carries listeners far away from the madness of everyday life with Koch’s characteristically evocative, dreamy, and crystalline musical landscapes backed by Kilbey’s poetic verse and sing-song vocal delivery.
The music can be breathtaking, as on “Return From War” and “The Priest’s Wife”. Koch is a special artist, often reimagining ancient music with his arsenal of traditional instruments, but he always does so with a tempered hand and a contemporary flair.
Koch’s frankly superb aesthetic vocabulary pairs so well with Kilbey’s vocals. Now 70, Kilbey’s voice shifts from smooth to snarling, often in the turn of the same lyrical phrase. With 50 years of rock and roll life under his belt, he adeptly shape-shifts from yearning and dreamy to irritable and terse as a song demands it.
Kilbey and Koch aren’t just in it for pretty music either. At times off-kilter and spooky (“In Poseidon’s Temple”, “Ballad of Qetesh”, “Unison”), “Songs From Atlantis” breathes with life as it really is; imperfect, ugly, and stunningly gorgeous.
On “Hyperion’s Oar” Koch’s acoustic guitars softly hold the remnants of the song’s structure (a stylistic element Koch is known for) as Kilbey mumbles, swallowed by underwater bubbles. “Calliope’s Song” is a gentle, understated beauty, pleasingly belying Calliope’s mythological personality, which was one of strength. In Greek mythology, she was the chief muse and goddess of dance, epic poetry, music, and song.
“The Black Sail” features Koch’s strumming of guitars and yaylı tambur (Turkish lute). The percussive style moves the tune along with urgency, complementing Kilbey’s assertive vocal. Like “Hyperion” this one slows and disintegrates with spoken word, jangled guitar bits, and hushed, haunted female voices.
“The Augur” begins the album, immediately setting the tone with Middle Eastern flourishes and pristine production that isolates every note, strum, and word. The Auger is the interpreter of the will of the gods. Like many songs on “Atlantis”, the tune seems to be built musically on the smallest margin of Koch’s song structure. Kilbey gives the song a firmer foundation with sing-song, unadorned delivery, leaving airiness as the song closes as if sinking in ocean. It’s a trick that Kilbey and Koch recreate time and again to astounding effect. Well played!
The digital album is available, but the physical CDs are currently sold out.
And if you haven’t had your fill, check out another April 2025 release, ”The Road to Tibooburra” from Steve Kilbey & The Winged Heels, which also features Koch on classical guitar, resonator guitar, electric guitar, bass, and BVs.
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