(Popfrenzy/Inertia)

Fifth studio album from Alasdair MacLean’s indie shimmerers

The Clientele are a proper indie guitar band, aesthetes a la The Smiths, Go-Betweens and Felt, immersed in art and literature as much as music and lifestyle. With its Paul Delvaux artwork and clean, ringing production, it was third album Strange Geometry that truly established The Clientele among Australian indie lovers. This is a band with surrealist manifestos next to their warm Church-like vocals and pristine Dunedin-esque jangling guitars. But like the classic indie bands, this pretension never filters into their music, which sounds as melancholic, melodic and exquisite as ever on new album Bonfires On The Heath. They blend Nilsson-esque acoustic guitar, wispy pianos, mariachi trumpets and a Bacharach-esque singalong chorus in opener I Wonder Who We Are, but they blend these supposedly disparate elements so artfully, that the song defies genre, just existing in its orb of golden pop loveliness. There’s a pastoral psychedelic quietness to Harvest Time, a dreamy, paisley-shirted nostalgia to Never Anyone But You and a gentle Velvets haze at the heart of Tonight’s nocturnal romanticism. Unifying the whole album is a great sense of sonic space and crispness, the aural equivalent of HD-TV. That MacLean and company have managed such a gorgeous sounding pop record will come as no surprise to those who’ve ever delved into The Clientele’s impressive back catalogue.

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MATT THROWER

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