Loch Lomond, Paper the Walls

reviewed by dave heaton

Consider Loch Lomond among the growing legion of “collectives” taking a good deal of their musical cues from Neutral Milk Hotel. There’s seven members, plus five more for live shows, playing guitar, strings, piano, banjo, saw, mandolin, whirly tubes, theremin and more. No proper drums, though, lending the music more of a folk-leaning sound than rock, with emphasis on mournful strings. Then there’s lead singer Ritchie Young’s unique voice, high yet anxious – on their previous EP Lament for Children it sometimes grated on me, but here it rises above, almost supernaturally.

There’s the expected fantasy side to the lyrics, but what impresses more is their deep sadness, from the first song “Carl Sagan”’s bitter “no one givs a fuck what we’ll become” to the second song’s “field report” to God (“I’ve wasted your time”) to “Witchy”’s description of a love relationship (“I’m a curse / I’m a curse / I’m a curse on you”) to the song title “Scabs on This Year”. The lightness of the music lends enough hope to the bleakness to make the album stop-you-in-your-tracks emotional at times, not to mention quite pretty. It all leads up to a finale which pulls the band’s Irish folk subtext out to the front of stage, for a bittersweet group sing-along: “All Your Friends Are Smiling.”

{www.hushrecords.com}