UNKLE – Where Did The Night Fall
August 4th, 2010 | Published in Reviews
UNKLE’s fourth outing sees them do away with the big star named which have littered their previous work and take the responsibility almost fully on themselves. Though littler known guest vocals are still a feature, when listening, it makes for a shift in listening attitude in stripping away the mask to see what’s underneath.
Given that this album will most likely slip under most people’s radars, an importance to make it a strong, concise effort should be a priority, but even with a wide variety of musical and cultural influences, the album suffers a few vital flaws. Primarily that nothing truly stands out. Now this admittedly may not be a flaw, as the album itself is consistently interesting, but there’s little here to connect with. Secondly, at fourteen tracks it does start to drag. Given that the general mood is melodic you can end up losing track of the tracks. So strangely it’s a great album if you don’t pay too much attention.
But there is a lot to love here, they do prove that they can stand on their own and the Bjork-esque vocals of Follow Me Down pitched against a Secret Machines inspired Natural Selection show that they hold plenty of weight.
A special mention should go the album art, especially of the deluxe edition, bold and artistic as if a nod that it knew it wasn’t to be a commercial success.
The fresh new start to resurrect UNKLE, you feel, will come down to how many friends have stuck around.
Check them out at www.unkle.com