Dutch Uncles - Cadenza

Manchester based Dutch Uncles, have just released their debut album, Cadenza, on Memphis Industries last week. The Uncles claim to put “clear water” between themselves and ‘Mancunian clichés’, and herald their cross-dressing ways and performances in churches as a key part of their identity. Well, at a first listen it’s clear that Dutch Uncles are anything but your standard Manchester band, bringing us Indie-pop in the style of MGMT, The Sleepy Jackson and Mew. They’re definitely not Oasis…

The album consists of eleven, strangely titled, tracks and the stomping opener Cadenza ushers us into the Uncles world. It’s a sweetly tinged, melodic little number and avoids the more introspective baggage of often associated with northeast England. Instead its sentiment dwells more in clouds. The album stays in the upper atmosphere with the euphoric Fragrant and Sting , the former gives prominence to a semi-synth guitar line, bringing to mind other stargazers such as Clor.

The band shows off their guitar skills once more in the frenzied Dressage which harks to the styles of some of the more recent British guitar bands like Maxїmo Park but it remains unique largely due to the vocal stylings of singer Duncan Wallis. This leads way for the track OCDUC where the band exercise the non-standard time signatures that are a central feature of the whole album, and Dolli shows off some intricate vocal harmonies. Both tracks put to the fore some key characteristics of Dutch Uncles’ sound.

X-O introduces the second half of Cadenza and it echoes the sounds of more recent underground artists close to home like Enemies and ASIWYFA before Wallis’ melodies returns us to the lofty home of the Uncles’ sound. The heavier Orvil follows in X-O’s footsteps, but gives way to a more stark contrast in its verses, with the drums being paired back, synth lines and pattering guitars taking control.

Pounding drums and distorted guitars seem to have been only a passing fancy for Dutch Uncles as the floaty The Rub follows the crashing tracks that preceded it. An intricately woven track, it rests on a bed of soft electric piano chords, gentle glockenspiel and subtle bass before being joined by lightly brushed drums. It’s easily the most pleasant and melodic track on the album. The Ink comes as a return to furious guitar playing from the album’s earlier tracks and the closer Zalo sees the band chose to leave us with a more grandiose depiction of their sound.

To me, Cadenza is almost a patchwork of left-of-centre artists of the present and the past. Mew, Clor, and Maxїmo Park can all be heard here, the result being a charming, but at times impersonal, album. Still though, there’s something marvellously ambitious and infectious about Cadenza. It’s an album firmly rooted in the present but striving for the future.

Drop-D Rating: 7/10

Published on Drop-D.ie, 16th May, 2011