Bent - 'The Everlasting Blink' (Sport / Ministry Of Sound)
3/5
By: Toby L
Can we really stand another of these pretentiously downbeat and sample-driven beats-combos..?
It's a debate that will last long into the night, the chart-show televisers rubbing their hands at the thought ('Yes, another motionless electronic-act - quick! Hire some tarty girls with knickers that finish up their arses to dance alongside their performance!'), whilst perhaps (and hopefully) the well-calculated music-fan declares an uncertainty. After all, following Moby's infamous tirade in recent times on TV-commercials ('Just to further the music - honest, Guv...'), aren't we sick to the back of eye-balls of this stuff?
Seemingly not, 'cos here comes another one - Bent, with the collective's second album, 'The Everlasting Blink'. Yet, much to our residing luck, this is a worthy shimmy through contemporary textures and styles which all nod towards a stoned Air or, alternatively, a particularly energised and hormonal Massive Attack.
The outing is lavish through and through, pulling out all the stops to sound as grandiose and classic as a ballroom-dancing scene from the 30s, and no less romantic; so expect leaps and bounds of unanticipated instrumental lushness and serenity, with the close of 'Strictly Bongo' or lullaby, slide-guitar ambience of 'Moonbeams' colliding with a wistful 'So Long Without You' to sound as enchanting as a lifetime within the haunted realms of a once-crowded opera-house.
Royally performed vocal-appearances here and there provide the work a springboard into more instant captivation ('Beautiful Otherness') and although 'Stay The Same' opens as if it's about to surge into a Queen-esque operatic-rocker (fortunately, it doesn't), the likes of a loungey 'Magic Love' or piano-trembling 'Thick Ear' are able to resuscitate any initial shock.
Only often a little too unassuming at times, the resounding quality and factor which provides Bent with a further success to their name is the album's sheer ear for instrumentation, hand-in-hand with a thirst for a disorientating, leisurely tip-toe through more styles and tones than usually exhibited. It may not be up there with the Moby's of this world for instant thrills, but 'The Everlasting Blink' is a worthy enough feat that you wouldn't want to let slip by once it's reared itself to your intrigued command.
Artists in this article: Bent
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