No Line North tread close to being a standard issue indie-rock band, what saves them from the ignominy of the average is a little bit of invention.
‘Begins Where it Ends’ starts the record; it has a decent chorus and the whole enterprise sounds like Dinosaur Jr (not always a good thing), only instead of J Mascis etching a solo all over the song, there’s a violin playing the lead guitar part and some vibraphone giggling in the background – you can hear from the get-go that there is something slightly different going on. ‘Fallow Fields’ repeats the trick and it would soon become so what if they didn’t have other devices to use. ‘Missing Piece’ subtracts most of the obvious rock and concentrates on vibes and violin, concocting a kind of Americana mousse, then there’s…
…‘Borrowed Time’ that starts with acoustic guitar before bringing in some muted brass that imbues the song with a sepia melancholy.
In the midst of this is ‘Leading You On’ which is pure Krautrock, the rhythm section quickly finds a groove and holds onto it like a Rottweiler on a toddler’s femur, the guitars stick to template, vibes softly float like the lights of a distant oil refinery – after four minutes the violin arrives and jolts the song into a new phase, then vocals arrive without affecting the bedrock of the song, the rhythm just continues on. All of the elements are working in complete harmony; it is a perfect way to spend eight and a half minutes of your life. Five years ago this group of folks put out a self-titled record as Closely Watched Trains which judging by what I can find, gathered plaudits and had a debt to Lonnie Donegan. This record reminds me more closely of Swearing at Motorists, or maybe Arcwelder, bands that make good quality indie-rock records. This is good quality indie-rock.