Fink, Biscuits for Breakfast

reviewed by anna battista

Electronica artist Fink must have thought that, after all, this genre is not everything there is in the world when he picked up an acoustic guitar and started playing it, going back to his first love since he was a teenager, guitar music. After completing a song, he sent it to Ninja Tune, telling them the vocals were courtesy of an American young talent he had recently spotted. The record label genuinely enjoyed the track and, after they commissioned a full-length album, Fink confessed he had actually done the music and vocals himself on that first track.

Completely recorded at Fink's 7Dials studio in Brighton, Biscuits For Breakfast is an introspective and at times bleak journey through a tortured soul. Opening track, 'Pretty Little Thing', a fine song in which beautiful guitar chords interweave with soft-spoken vocals, sets the tone for the rest of the album. Delicate patterns create mysterious atmospheres in 'Pills In My Pockets', a song about a failed attempt at a date at the Glastonbury Festival, while 'Biscuits' mixes depth-charge percussive minimalism with a soulful voice and 'Hush Now', featuring Tina Grace on vocals, is a coquettish blues. The album also includes the latest single 'So Long', a mix of charming soul rhythms, and the cover of Alison Moyet's 'All Cried Out', that turns in Fink's hands into a gentle and hopelessly romantic melody.

Biscuits For Breakfast has already drawn comparisons to John Martyn, but the truth is that this sensitive and visionary album in which every single track is treated with reverence and respect, is absolutely unique and definitely defies any comparison.

{www.ninjatune.net, www.finkworld.org}