CD Review: We Came From Waters - Unfamous Quotes

Written by Peer Lebrecht Saturday, 14 April 2012 13:16

Artist: We Came From Waters
Title: Unfamous Quotes
Genre: Indie Rock / Post-Punk
Release Date: 23rd March 2012
Label: Danse Macabre

Album Review

So what are your first associations with Greece? Things like economical and financial hard times? Surely! Holidays, food and dusty ruins? Maybe… Gods, philosophers and the origins of democracy? Depends on you, but a post-punk influenced Indie Rock mixed with elements of Goth, Darkwave and a pinch of progressivity and avant-garde? Not really, right? And that´s really a pity, cause over the last years it emerged that Greece owns not only a very active music-scene (far beyond folklore and disco), but also a very interesting one. One of these bands it is worth to put a focus on is WE CAME FROM WATERS, a four-piece outfit, that got together in early 2011 just for sending out a first sign a few months later with an EP named ‘Famous Quotes’. And about one year later we´re faced with their first fulltime album, bearing the lovely and consequent title ‘Unfamous Quotes’.

JOY DIVISION, THE CURE and INTERPOL are the three bands revealed as references by the press-sheet and this causes mixed feelings, then the anticipated intersection isn’t that large for expecting a lot of variety and diversity (when both of the latter bands left the circle very quickly)! And it´s just the first song, ‘Android’, that asks for a lot of patience, when strolling and roughened up guitars fight towards without a palpable changing of chords and harmonies, like an acoustic Moebius strip, accompanied by simple and stoical machine drums. On the contrary it´s that monotony that makes the vocals more impressive, which (besides it´s really enjoyable timbre) takes response for the whole melodic and harmonic direction of the opener. ‘Yellow Position’ is taking that torch and adopts the impelling drums and the great bumpy bass-line for dictating the way with heavy guitar volleys and weird electronic background-colours. I confess I miss a bit a textural structure up to now, something like a chorus or a melodic anchor, although the shifty singing of Alex makes it hard to fix the point where that missing is placed exactly!

After the fading of the insect-like intro ‘A Silence like Poetry’ keeps the explored track with its rusty guitar circling around the repetitive chant for creating a trouble spot fuelled by unrest aggression and sparks. Time to change pace and mood. ‘Permition Admition’ is something like a gloomy void crawling down the floor, benumbed with density and tonal viscosity, an acoustic toxication dazing time and space. So it feels redeeming to become inundated by ‘We came from Waters’ with its perceptible changings in the course, bringing you back in a state of conscious for ‘The Maze’, an energetic skeleton with a slight bearing on classical Goth Rock elements like lining distorted guitars, the straight and strict drum-pattern, a certain kind of undercooled monotony and the crooning vocals.

‘Childs Play’ turns out to be one of the albums most sticking and striking moments. Bass and guitar combine to a hard-edged river, powered by a minimalistic rhythm, carrying the rudderless raft, on which the vocals yearn and muse, exhaling a breath of despair and melancholy, that makes you feel lonely and abandoned on the monochrome banks. And here you lay down for witness ‘The Crash’, the albums most intense and touching track. A releasing sadness rises from the horizon, coloured by a sweet melodic dance of guitars and bass, finding it´s shape in the emotional and stirring vocals, which suck us down in the waters we obviously come from...

‘Unfamous Quotes’ leaves you with a feeling of instability behind. It feels a bit disturbing, like stitching the needle in the same prick again and again. It´s that density that changes its shape and colour too insufficiently for bestowing enough individuality and concreteness on the single tracks. It seems to grab and drag you, making a detour before you reach the great finish of the last songs. WE CAME FROM WATERS know how to celebrate an atmosphere convincingly, with all its shades and masks, but the emotional spectre seems a bit to achromatic for a bunch of eight songs. A bit more tonal variety, a bit more welkin for the vocal´s stunning trajectory and I´m lying in wait for their next output...


Tracklist

01. Android
02. Yellow Position
03 .A Silence Like Poetry
04. Permition / Admition
05. We Came From Waters
06. The Maze
07. Childs Play
08. Crash


Line-up

Alex – Vocals
Fotis – Guitars
Thander – Bass
Self Mutilator – Electronics


Website

www.wecamefromwaters.co.cc


Cover Picture




Rating

Music: 7
Sound: 7
Total: 7 /10


Buy the album here!