(Spunk/EMI)

New album from half of Sunderland math-pop geniuses Field Music

When brothers David and Peter Brewis disbanded Field Music after 2007’s excellent Tones Of Town, it wasn’t because they were finished with music. David released School Of Language’s low-key Sea From Shore earlier this year, and Peter has now put out The Week That Was – a conceptually and temporally (barely 33 minutes!) tighter effort. Produced by David and retaining the distinctive Field Music drum sound, TWTW is eight rhythmic slices of intelligent pop music, crafted with near-immaculate care. Lyrically it purports to tell a dark crime story from fragmented perspectives, giving each track a compelling yet opaque feel. Musically it’s layered so well that repeated listens inevitably turn up more surprises, with vibraphone, piano, flute, string and vocal harmonies strategically deployed throughout. Opener Learn To Learn provides an ominous urgency to what follows, but there are moments of wistfulness as well. The cinematic It’s All Gone Quiet drifts on sparse piano notes, while the lovely The Airport Line contains the best use of chamber pop strings this year. With its deftly inserted guitars, closer Scratch The Surface revives the early walloping rhythms; it’s menacing lyrics (“Don’t be so wet lad, it’s only a scratch / You’re crying like a girl…”) given an incongruous sheen by Brewis’s north-eastern English choirboy vocals. It’s all defiantly arty, and therefore probably won’t appeal to Fratellis fans; but if a less hyperactive Foals or a more Beatles-influenced Battles sounds like a good thing, then investigate this little gem immediately.

****½

TOPHER HEALY

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