Staff Reviews

The Proper Ornaments - Foxhole

Review by Jasper Willems

Foxhole offers a bittersweet daze, reflected by a wellspring of elemental pop.»

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The Proper Ornaments are back with an album that recalls all the best bits of third LP Velvets, Darklands era Mary Chain, Real Estate, Crystal Stilts and more, but with their own unique laidback groove. Proper Ornaments is the project of James Hoare (Ultimate Painting, Veronica Falls) and Max Oscarnold (Toy, Pink Flames). On Third album Foxhole they've sliced away a whole stratum of their sound, removing some distortion and lowering the frequency of plectrum strokes to allow more nuanced, piano-led ideas to emerge. What was in evidence in two of their earliest songs - You Still and Are You Going Blind - an understated, poetic play of moral sensitivity against a callous distance, of warmth and hostility, has reached its most sustained expression yet and gives their pop moments of a haunted love song quality along the lines of Del Shannon, Lesley Gore or Roy Orbison. Proper Ornaments hold the attraction of seeming to not try very hard at all and achieve something outstanding nonetheless.
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