Music Review//Smoke Fairies - Blood Speaks

There is cold wind blowing over this album but despite the storm cloud driven guitar lines and vocals that evoke the dark skies of your favourite city at night this at its heart a full blooded musical experience that you can’t help but be involved in.

Opener Let Me Know holds a powerful lead vocal and guitar combination that evokes the feel of driving along in a seriously emotive windstorm. It’s a immediate grabber and perfect for opening the album and the track that follows it Awake takes a honeyed vocal and guitar line and uses it to create a truly impressive song. The words and music meld together perfectly and then succeeds to the pulsing riff that opens The Three of Us. It’s an experience of a song and it’s harmonies are the key factor in catching the ear by surprise with truly excellent lyrics and guitar interludes carrying the Celtic inspired music along nicely.

Title track Blood Speak is the longest of the album and it’s a slow burning one at that. With operatic backing harmonies creating a bittersweet feel to the song it’s a definite album highlight? Elsewhere the back end of the album slows it down a bit in terms of music but not in its quality and atmosphere and Version of the Future and Film Reel close the album in excellent fashion.

In summation then this album is distinctly dark in tone yet holds bold warmth that keeps your attention all the way through.  Enjoy it at sunset and you may just find new aspects to life you hadn’t before.

Words by Sebastian Gahan.