Artist: Paper Aeroplanes
Title: Little Letters
Genre: Pop / Folk
Release Date: 17th May 2013
Label: Navigator Records
Album Review
Both artists, Sarah Howells and Richard Llewellyn, grew up not far from each other in Wales and started making music together already in 2005. Four years later, they founded PAPER AEROPLANES, soon developing from an insider top to one of the most popular new bands in Wales. With ‘Little Letters’, the duo already released its third album. Musically, Sarah and Richard are influenced by such musicians as Veirs, Bjork, Jeff Buckley, Gillian Welch, Everything But The Girl and Lucinda Williams. ‘Little Letters’ moves a little away from the two previous albums, making PAPER AEROPLANES more sound like a band than a due, but still most important for the musicians are catchy and atmospheric folky pop songs. Their compositions are picturesque stories inspired by their pastoral education, and emotional extremes of past liaisons and friendships.
Sarah says about the songs: “We’re constantly inspired by our home towns and the stark, coastal imagery of the wild west. This album is about personal experiences in relationships and the inner, mostly hidden lives of people, as opposed to what you see on the surface. My main aim when writing is to express something that I would normally find hard to put into words. It’s definitely a cathartic process.” So let’s dig into the music now. The album starts quite spirited with ‘When The Windows Shook’, telling tragedies from Sarah’s home town Milford Haven, suffering from an explosion in an oil refinery in 1994, an oil catastrophe at Welsh coast two years later and last but not least, four people died in 2011 by another explosion in Chevron refinery in Pembroke, not far from Sarah’s home.
But of course there are not only tragic songs on the album. Wonderful ‘Sleeper Train’ was written by Sarah during a train journey from Xi’an to Beijing, dealing with the love to someone in Great Britain via SMS while she was travelling China. According to Sarah, ‘Multiple Love’ and ‘Circus’ are the most honest songs on the album. ‘Circus’ deals with the life as musician and the daily frustration this job can bring. ‘Multiple Love’ could be the perfect song for singles, if it wasn’t too sad. It tells about the waiting for Mr./Mrs. Right instead just doing something. The album’s title track is quite varied with some more tempo. Overall, the album contains eleven fantastic songs, full of emotions with great melodies.
But the album not only offers remarkable songs by Sarah and Richard, it was recorded with two more extraordinary musicians: John Parker on big bass and percussionist Martin Ditcham (Everything But The Girl, Talk Talk, Sade). ‘Little Letters’ was partly produced by Phill Brown, who already worked with such bands like Bob Marley, Bombay Bicycle Club or Talk Talk. His old-school way of working is very well audible in the album – warm sounds due to the analogue recording and the relaxed, atmospherically dense rhythm section are the base for the extraordinary songs. ‘Little Letters’ is a nearly intimate and extensive sound track out of the duo’s life: any song is a little letter with important memories and pointed personnel notes. Result is honest album with melodies sticking in your ear.
Tracklist
01. When The Windows Shook
02. Red Rover
03. Singing To Elvis
04. Fable
05. Little Letters
06. Multiple Love
07. At The Altar
08. Palm Of Your Hand
09. Silence The Bells
10. Sleeper Train
11. Circus
Line-up
Sarah Howells – Vocals
Richard Llewellyn – Guitar
Website
http://www.paperaeroplanesmusic.com / https://www.facebook.com/paperaeroplanesmusic
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 9
Sound: 9
Extras: -
Total: 9 / 10
