Rock & Folk (translation by Ghostchild) Talking about the Pixies, some songs on "The Beatific Visions" evoke with happiness a jolly Frank Black, pop-rock built for college radio that is reminiscent of early Belle & Sebastian. Recorded in Nashville with Stuart Sikes, their second album resumes the feeling of urgency that was on "Give Blood": songs scarcely last longer than 2 minutes and explore a broad musical spectrum, from country to punk via irresistible melodic slogans.
The LP gets off to a great start with two lessons of contemporary punk: the Ramones-ish "Hold Me In The River" and the heady "Margarita". Then the rhythm slows down and little by little the four boys from Brighton give some peaceful and sensitive ritornellos. The calm does not last long. The record starts again with "Spring Chicken", a twist doped with amphetamines and the smashed-up punk "Porcupine or Pineapple?". In the end, "The Beatific Visions" is jolly rock zapping, damn agreeable and well done. One of the beautiful surprises of the beginning of the year. 4/5
entertainment.ie Remember when Brakes first materialised? Most people smiled, but shook their heads dismissively. 'Those wags, with their 30 second pop songs' one girl said. 'They're a part-time band, they'll never last' another sage hipster counselled. 'Novelty act!' some random haircut even denounced. Yet, here we are, four years on, second album out, and all four members fully committed to their cause. In fact, is it even appropriate to call the Brighton band a 'supergroup' anymore? Since singer Eamon Hamilton quit British Sea Power for good to concentrate on Brakes full-time last year, the band have gone from strength to strength; Give Blood was an explosive collection of versatile pop-rock tunes that rarely exceeded two minutes, yet packed more fun into those two minutes than most bands usually do over the course of an entire album.
Can we expect more of the same from The Beatific Visions, then? Well, yes and no: Hamilton and his Electric Soft Parade and Tenderfoot associates recorded their sophomore effort in Nashville, and it shows. Not only are most tracks more spit 'n' sawdust-country than the dulcet twang occasionally interwoven through Give Blood, but Beatific Visions's overall sound is both more mature and more complete than its predecessor.
For each eccentric ditty, there's a heartfelt, Nashville-imbued croon (If I Should Die Tonight, Mobile Communication). Hamilton's lyrics are as sharp and witty as ever, and he proves that he can write classic summery pop songs too: the title track is a gorgeous Ben Folds-style tune, doused in sun-rays and Beach Boys-esque harmonies 'Here she comes, with summer in her heels / You can meet her at the station to escape for a day'.
When all is said and done, The Beatific Visions still only clocks in at 28 minutes; but when the quality is as good as this, they'll be amongst the 28 best you'll ever spend. Highly recommended. 4 Stars.
100b.blogspot.com Picks For 2006: Brakes, The Beatific Visions: If I Should Die Tonight, Spring Chicken. Beatific Visions was my choice for Album Of The Month back in November. They somehow manage to put everything you want from the world into one short album, it's amazing.
GQ Also worth a listen: The Beatific Visions, the excellent second album from the Brakes.
Irish News Albums of the year '06. Back on this side of the pond, Belle & Sebastian and Brakes - who toured together at the start of the year - both released essential albums in The Life Pursuit and The Beatific Visions. Brakes manage to mix Pixies-style furious rock with twanging country melodies to great effect.
Northern Express Various members of bands British Sea Power and Electric Soft Parade have combined their varied and many musical skills to craft this hybrid band, and the whole shebang recently flew to Nashville to record with White Stripes producer Stuart Sikes. The results are intriguing, as the new group brings in influences from both of their previous projects (plus a tinge of that raw garage sound from Sikes), and also seem to channel a bit of their legendary surroundings, as well. Jittery guitars and Eamon Hamilton's distinctive, reedy vocals form a backdrop for quirky lyrics that often as not focus on political or technological issues, this combination of elements showcasing to best effect on tracks like Mobile Communication with its obviously Nashville-inflected steel guitar, If I Should Die Tonight, with a reckless piano part taking center stage, the catchy Margarita, and the zippy Cease and Desist.
musicallysound.blogspot.com Review Of 2006: Pithiness defined Brakes' excellent 2005 debut Give Blood, and rare is it to see musicians express a political view as succinctly as Brakes do in the first verse of opening track "Hold Me In The River": 'I woke up late and found my liberty lost / It had been written down in law as a security cost'. If only Sting knew such brevity. Beatific Visions' triumph is its electicness, with it never leaving the listener on one musical strand long enough to induce boredom. One moment vocalist Eamon Hamilton is pontificating animatedly about who would win in a battle between a porcupine or a pineapple (continuing, however eccentricly, the anti-war theme), the next he's moved onto the surprisingly touching "Mobile Communication".
Enfield Independent The pastoral airs of Midlake are matched by the quieter moments of Brakes - notably If I Should Die Tonight, the pedal-steel melancholia of Mobile Communication and the hushed finale of No Return - on the second short, sharp release from the ad-hoc offshoot of British Sea Power and Electric Soft Parade.
Their transfer from Brighton to Nashville may have shifted their music up country, but Eamon Hamilton and Alex and Tom White have retained the jabbing shocks and art-punk irreverence of their caustic debut on the deranged Spring Chicken, thrashing Cease Or Desist and 66-second burn of Porcupine Or Pineapple? These Beatific Visions are happy, sad, mad/not mad: a bipolar record in other words.
blog.myspace.com/upthedownescalator Albums Of The Year: Bloody hell, weren't you, like, someone's side project? This is a proper album and brilliant from end to end. Leaving British Sea Power and going full-time was, with hindsight, exactly the right thing to do.
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