You know Australia don't you? Big lump down at the bottom of things, big tanned Bruces and bronzed Sheilas, lugging surf boards down to their shark infested shore line and occasionally troubling the wider musical world with hard rocking types.
Sensitive, shoe-gazing, DIY musicians must surely have the sand kicked in their bedroom-pallor’s faces before the culprits jog away laughing to suck down tubes of amber nectar at the barbeque. Cellophane Rain don't seem to care and have stuck to their pop guns to produce an album of shimmering beauty.
Brendan Zietsch and Laura Ferris have been virtual presences to me for some time now - I'm a regular visitor to their Myspace page and plugged them in my space explorer column. I liked their melodic, harmonic, uplifting melancholy so much, I told them and they sent me their eponymous debut album. This is gentle stuff - perfect to wake up to - and it makes me feel warm inside. Think The Cocteau Twins, think Sarah Records, go on allow yourself a little whimsy and charm - all Korn and no Stars makes jack a wrist-slitting boy.
Laura Ferris is a fine singer, often self-harmonising to great effect, with a sweet sadness to her voice, given childlike yippee-yapping bounce on perfect album opener "Good Morning Light". The tune's the thing, and it's almost always a vocal melody, given a fuzzy weight with harmonies and sung counter-melodies - guitar solos, there were none (Ok, there's one. I counted).
Don't expect a blizzard of feedback or rumbling bass, but strings, glockenspiels, accordions, pianos, organs, and clarinet are woven into the feather bed on which these gossamer voices float. This is done to best and even Pet Sounds-ish effect on "My Place". There are those who will find Cellophane Rain a little lightweight or saccharine even and I'll take a punt that they're probably a couple of real romantics - but it's a cold hard world out there and I can certainly make room for a bit of dreaming and doting.
If the swoonsome twosome come close to rocking out - there are what I assume to be programmed beats throughout, which stay away from dreaded lazy looping - it's on "Orchid".
Got room for a little idealism, a little romanticism and a sojourn in comfort and care in your record collection? As a work in process there's such promise here and there are a number of directions in which Cellophane Rain could now travel.
You can't buy this record in stores, or even at Amazon, so you'll need to visit the band's Myspace.
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