Album Review: There Will Be Fireworks

There Will Be Fireworks- 'There Will Be Fireworks' (The Imaginary Kind)

From the very start of There Will Be Fireworks’ self-titled debut, you know you’re in for something a bit different. Atmospheric clicks and noises give way to an elegiac ascending guitar melody as Stornoway poet Kevin MacNeil enters with a spoken-word monologue. ‘There Will Be Fireworks’ he promises in his buccaneering tones, ‘And they will light-up your eyes.’ It’s a bold way to open any album, never mind your first, but it soon becomes apparent that There Will Be Fireworks are not your average band.

The sleepy, low-key meanderings of ‘So The Story Goes’ is followed by the melancholic majesty of ‘Midfield Maestro’, as Nicholas McManus sings ‘Your unravelling in my arms’ while Gibran Farrah’s guitar wails in the background. The pretty guitar arpeggios of ‘Guising’ then segue into a maelstrom of distortion, as ‘Off With Their Heads’ explodes with the sound of a band rocking-out at full-force.

‘A Kind of Furnace’ features an achingly beautiful piano part while ‘We Sleep Through The Bombs’ is swept along by propulsive drum rhythms and soaring vocals. It’s the sheer scale of musical ambition on show which is most impressive. There’s a real spirit of experimentation, with piano, strings, brass, accordion, glockenspiels and swirling feedback all being used to serve the texture of the songs. However, on an album with such a lush sonic palette, ‘Foreign Thoughts’ still manages to stand-out. ‘She says she barely sleeps/and when she does it’s fitfully’ sings McManus over a startlingly evocative guitar refrain.

It’s rare for a band to have such a daring artistic vision for their first album, but There Will Be Fireworks have pulled it off spectacularly.

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