I mentioned The Cave Singers a little while ago, and I am going to see them on Thursday when they support Band of Horses in Glasgow. So no Edinburgh gigs for me this week, but I can live with that. I got into these guys by virtue of a piece of promotional vinyl which I was sent by their label, which goes to show that if you pick what you send to people carefully enough then you can still get good results with relatively old-fashioned methods.

It’s not the kind of music that is likely to make a shuddering impact on your psyche. As Tim from The Daily Growl observes, there are precious few directly obvious hooks as such, more a creeping atmosphere that shifts and sways and pulls you into the song more slowly.

What we have here is a sort of scratchy, backwoods folk sound that sounds like it originated in a cabin deep in the forests of America’s Pacific Coast. This isn’t exceptionally far from the truth, seeing as the band come from Atlanta, but their collective past in rougher indie spheres brings a growling undercurrent to their music that lifts it away from the realm of pure folk.

The North-West coast is awash with brilliant bands at the moment, most of whom seem to be exploring folk music from one angle or another, with varying degrees of indie tension and feedback mixed in there – Loch Lomond, Horsefeathers and The Builders & the Butchers, to name but a few. The Cave Singers perhaps bring a little more uneasiness to proceedings than most others, but that’s more an issue of the spectral atmosphere of some of the music than any predilection for feedback. A grumbling guitar simmers under the surface of a few of these songs, bringing just that hint of darkness that tilts Invitation Songs away from the prettiness of much folk-influenced output these days.

As such the result is an album which, although it tails off in the latter third, brings an splendid ambiguity to the listening of it. There’s warmth and comfort in much of the sound, but often a slight undercurrent, as with the sterling Helen. The nasal voice adds a little to the uneasiness, but overall this is a comforting and, yes, inviting record of lovely indie-folk that will, if you let it, seep slowly and warmly into your consciousness. Gorgeous.

The Cave Singers – Helen
The Cave Singers – Called

myspace | hype | amazon