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REVIEWS

Reviews for Alter Later's cover of 'Winter Kills' by Yazoo on the Second Language compilation, 'Drifts & Flurries'
Released January 2021

"Alter Later’s 'Winter Kills', featuring Mücha, sounds like a stripped-back version of Portishead’s more intimate moments – a minimal piano line, claustrophobic production and background whisperings combine with a reserved vocal performance that promises and then withholds a wealth of emotion. The effect is stunning."

Thomas Blake, Folk Radio, March 2021

Full review here

"But the most remarkable vocal piece comes from Alter Later (feat. Mücha) ~ a remake of Yazoo’s “Winter Kills” that updates the classic in reverent yet renovating fashion, with new inflection on the line, 'tear at you searching for weaker seams.'"

postrockcafé, A Closer Listen, February 2021 

Full review here

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Reviews for 'Fear of Shame' and Alter Later tracks on the Second Language compilation, 'Avenue with Trees'
Released August 2020

"The mood here is languid. Oliver Cherer‘s plaintive ‘Untitled 1983 Demo’ might boast the most plaintively perfect vocal you’ll hear all year, and one-time Piano Magic man Paul Tornbohm employs affectingly melancholy jazz chords for ‘Fear Of Shame’. Elsewhere, original acid-folk pioneer Mark Fry contributes the wistful ‘Half An Hour’, and Yumi Mashiki’s ‘Ophelia’ is a delicate piano composition that hangs in the evening air with exquisite fragility. An album of wistful sighs, of late-night regret and utterly transcendent musicianship."

Bob Fischer, Electronic Sound magazine, Issue 67, July 2020

Full review here

More reviews for 'Avenue with Trees'

Concrete Islands

Music Won't Save You (Italy)

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Reviews for 'Closure', Piano Magic
Released January 2017

"A groovy, jazzy vibes solo lightens the load of the remorseful lyrics of ‘You Never Stop Loving (The One That You Love)’, while mournful strings, weeping brass, and Johnson’s confessional, despondent lyrics place ‘Attention To Life’ deep inside dirgy Tindersticks, The Cure or Joy Division territory. Ending with (perhaps) a nod towards their penultimate album’s title, ‘I Left You Twice, Not Once’ features yet another tantalising adieu, as Johnson confesses one last time: “I could not bear to say goodbye”. Violins follow our quartet into the sunset, as a lonely piano plays a magical coda to a brilliant album and an unforgettable career."

Jeff Penczak, Soundblab, January 2017

Full review here 

“The group’s final album ranks with their best” 4 stars – Mojo

 

“….recalls the art-rock of 4AD acts such as Pale Saints…There’s also Go-Betweens-style melancholy…intricate guitar lines recall Television’s…”  8/10 – Uncut

“Smooth, finely crafted and very songwriterly affair (with echoes of Talk Talk, The Auteurs and Roy Harper)” – The Wire

“Closure is undoubtedly a reliably contrarian, brutally honest and uncompromisingly human album for a great band to – at least try – calling it quits on.” – Delusions Of Adequacy

“…as fitting endings go, it’s absolutely the kittens’ whiskers.” – Terrascope

“These masters of dark wave have certainly left an indelible mark”- 4 stars – Songwriting Magazine 

“Their final album finds them in rude artistic health. If you want to know what you’ve missed, Closure provides an excellent hint.” – Shindig!

More reviews for 'Closure'

Record Collector

All Music Guide

The Irish Times

God is in the TV

The Skinny

Peek-A-Boo

Freq

Feature opposite from Uncut, Jan 2017

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