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motorama poverty
Artist: Motorama
Title: Poverty
Genre: New Wave
Release Date: 30th January 2015
Record Label: Talitres Records


Album Review

Despite all the present-day political thin ice I have to confess that I've an affection for Russia. For the people, their mentality, it's history, it's culture and particularly its music. The Classic and the Folklore, but especially the one emerging from under the surface, prospering vigorously in the penumbra of an untamed and obviously vivid subculture. So I'm not sure if it's related to the cardinal direction I was born in or a kind of a spiritual kinship but over the years I was rummaging for and have found so many exciting music, so many stunning bands, which thrilled and attracted me, bemused with their otherness. Maybe it be geopolitical reasons, the entrenched cultural background or an allopatric creativity, but somehow all these bands, although influenced from the same primal sources like the musical "underground" in the European heartland, have developed a deviating and special musical language, a vocabulary that deals differently with genres and their templates, in a more easier and innovative way, more relaxed and enjoyable refreshing.

SCOFFERLANE, HUMAN TETRIS, BRANDENBURG, THE BLACKMAIL, THE VICTORY DAY, MANICURE (just to name a few of the more known one)... it seemed inevitable not to hit the mother lode and so I think it was a kind of fatalism (and a question of time) that I had to come across MOTORAMA one day, then a relatively unknown band in these climes (originating from Rostov-On-Don, deep in the heart of southern Russia), now unstoppable leaving the rung of being an insider's tip beyond borders. Then they had just released their second long-player named ‘Calendar’ (after the debut ‘Alps’ and a bunch of EPs and singles) and they got me hooked from the very first tune. It is always hard to explain a sensation rationally and objective, but I think it was the feigned simplicity of their music, the partly unburdened sonic ingenuousness that easily created the catchiest melodies combined with a so fragile emotiveness and vulnerability what caught me, that kind of melancholy and sadness  that makes you just lean back and smile. And I confess it followed a time I hardly heard anything else while fighting every new day and I was more than excited and nervous when they announced album #3 for this January.

So what to expect? Disappointment or an on-going happy sadness? A creative sweeping blow or familiar reassurance? To anticipate the outcome - I'm not disappointed. Not at all. ‘Poverty’ is all but it's names association, it seems to mirror the pearly nucleus, the musical essence of MOTORAMA´s styles and shorelines so far. There are these feathery swan songs like ‘Heavy Wave’, which dresses lines like: "Goodbye my past here comes a vague taste of bitter future... goodbye future I stayed in my memories goodbye future I'm done with it..." in sparkling melodies of guitars and keys, which bewitch you for pulling you down to a mellow comforting gloom, observed and accompanied by Vladislav Parshin´s vocals, which always seem to sound from a distance next to you, privy but somehow invariably a few spheres away. Or the opener ‘Corona’ with its bustling bass line and gleefully organ tunes, which let it sound like a descendant of their gloomy and velvet-like debut, that merged the bleakness of their earlier songs with the spotted and timid lights of  New Wave and Indie-Pop (a progress finding its purpose on the above mentioned ‘Calendar’ two years later).

But there are also songs like the tensioned ‘Similar Way’, the whirling ‘Write to me’ or the album's forerunner ‘Dispersed Energy’, which seem to hark back to the band's early days with their swirling basses, unfussy drum patterns, clean and sharp guitars and the compulsory echo voice-effect, clearly influenced by the sparse and monochrome sound of early post-punk a la JOY DIVISION, THE SOUND or larval-stage THE CURE. A favourite? Difficult, but ‘Lottery’ denies to leave my head, resounding between my temples since the album's first run. Low-saturated memories, the taste of rain or tears (who cares), that releasing feeling of being stabbed through the heart, which always comes along with a parting and strangely there's always the sea somewhere. An occupation I really appreciate.

So what's left to say? With ‘Poverty’, MOTORAMA followed their pursued way in a confident and likewise seductive manner, always balancing between alluring melodies and a soothingly whispering wistfulness, that makes your heart sink... in the most pleasant way. "...heavy wave from a weird dream where I am forever alone..."


Tracklist

01. Corona
02. Dispersed Energy
03. Red Drop
04. Heavy Wave
05. Impractical Advice
06. Lottery
07. Old
08. Similar Way
09. Write To Me


Line-up

Vladislav Parshin – Vocals, Guitars
Airin Marchenko – Bass
Maxim Polivanov – Guitars
Alexander Norets – Keyboards
Oleg Chernov – Drums


Website

http://wearemotorama.com / https://www.facebook.com/wearemotorama


Cover Picture

motorama poverty


Rating

Music:9
Sound: 8
Total: 8.5 / 10





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