26 Feb 2013

My Drunken Haze "Pleasing Illusions" Review


Reviewed by Nathan Ford

Those Greek's sure love their psychedelia, and who can blame them?
The latest interesting blip on my Greek psych radar comes in the form of "Pleasing Illusions", the debut E.P from My Drunken Haze.
My Drunken Haze introduce themselves as lovers of sixties cinematic sounds, psychedelic pop and dream pop - so, very much my sort of thing.
They've pretty much described their sound with that statement too - imagine a slightly less adventurous Broadcast (to clarify - pretty much everyone is less adventurous than Broadcast in my book), with the majority of the keyboard parts replaced by guitars (there's still some very nice psychedelic organwork too), completely blanketed in a cosy, reverbed dreampop / shoegaze haze.
It's generally quite hard to get an idea of a band's sound with just three tracks, but this is a very fully fleshed out debut from a group who have managed to toe the line between diversity and having a solid aural identity perfectly on the first attempt.
Matina Sous Peau's ghostly vocals cast a dominant shadow over everything here, but songwriter and guitarist Spir Frelini ain't no slouch either, whether it be the slashing fuzz guitars of "Pleasing Illusions" or the tremeloed suspense building of "Sweet Sixteen".
It'll be intriguing to hear how My Drunken Haze blossom into an album band, but in the meantime this will do very nicely indeed.
Stream it below or e-mail the band at mydrunkenhazeband@gmail.com to buy a copy on CD.

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