On first listen, worthy of the hype. Touching, funny, beautiful with a bop - the artifice and grandiosity somehow makes possible what feels like an authentic human connection.
Not ground-breaking but the arrangements are tastefully innovative, and the performances exceptional.
Very pleasant but a little safe compared with, say, Nepenthe. Rarely dull, but equally rarely as exhilarating as I'd hoped.
I may be a biased Dudley boy but this is excellent. Saw them live earlier this year and loved the energy, but this has a lot more contrast and subtlety than I was expecting, without losing any intensity.