Galw - The Voices lure me in

Galw

​The Voices lure me in
self-released; 2016

3.7 out of 5

By Mike Pryzgoda
​

The new album from Galw The Voices lure me in is a collection of chilled out acoustic folk music that could exist in a 1960s coffeehouse. With alternating and harmonized vocals there are some The Civil Wars influences as well as Airport Convention.

“I Will Find You” opens the album with a guitar line reminiscent of The Smashing Pumpkins' "Tonight, Tonight." The voice is very high pitched which against the guitar can be very stark but certainly calls attention to itself. The addition of harmony vocals near the end of the song is a surprising but pleasant touch.

​“Caged Bird” has an Oasis feel to the strumming pattern. Here the singer sounds more like Hope Sandoval, and her voice really soars in this range. The song is perhaps a bit long and the harmonies at the end work but feel unnecessary. “Lonely Black Veil” is an up-tempo song with insistent percussion. The descant harmony is extremely effective as is the melody solo (possibly on dulcimer?).

The album really begins to pick up at this point. There are two songs sung in Welsh: “Heno Ma” and “Coffia Fi” which have absolutely gorgeous harmonies. “Old Soul” evokes a hypnotic Nick Drake over creaky guitar strings  “Other Kings Fell Before Him” is a modal song, almost Zeppelin-like with some incredible high tight harmonies that almost sounds like synthesized woodwinds buzzing around in the background. The album closes with “Keep Your Head Above The Water” a calm quasi-folk-country song with an interesting counter melody in guitar bass line, and a similar vibe to the opening track, almost making it a bookend.

The songwriting overall is very interesting and the two voices of Galw blend together really well.   Some of the songs have similar vibes and perhaps packaging the songs as two EPs rather than one full album could connect them a bit more to each other and help them stand out.

Tweet