Hotly anticipated new double album ‘Little Eden’ from legendary band The Bevis Frond, released 10th September – the band’s 35th Anniversary. Set against the austerity of post-modernism, The Bevis Frond’s new album glows with vintage McCartney-esque couplets before rolling out a chiming signature riff on ‘As I Lay Down To Die’ and adopting Jimi-like phrasing on ‘And Away We Go’.
It’s a psychedelically-hewn panoramic take on modern Britain punctuated with pure pop melodies and beautifully-observed English melancholy; like Ray Davies coming down as he muses on the collapse of British tradition and traditionalism.
This is an album that yearns for better days signposted by the brutalism of the housing estates that main man Nick Saloman photographed for the cover, right through to the soap opera saga of ‘They Will Return’ ( a retrospective take for those just hanging on).
The album reels with an enveloping whiff of maturity that pervades the fatalistic ‘Do Without Me’ and the haunting ‘Hold Your Horses’ which sounds like a Dylan out-take from ‘The Basement Tapes’.
‘Little Eden’ rekindles your love of music – from the harmonies that are oh-so Teenage Fanclub and Lemonheads, to the grunge and awe of Dinosaur Jr.
There’s perspective and retrospective tale-spinning where we wait “for the wonderful world to come” (©‘Start Burning’), an imaginary future soundtracked by the spirit of Arthur Lee, brought into focus with witty wordplay (who else could dot in “sarcophagus” but a former Countdown champion?) on songs that are littered with spine tingling guitar breaks that climax on the epic closer, the ten-minute plus ‘Dreams Of Flying’, an acid flashback with incendiary dueling guitars, a blast of the good times for these hard times.
Just what you want from “the E17 psych guru.” MOJO
