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LP
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WSR 040LP
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Thomas House has been making music for a long while now. First as the driving force behind Charlottefield and then as a team player with acts as diverse as Picore, Sloath, Joeyfat and Haress. When Charlottefield disbanded, House changed things up. No more would his personal musical endeavors be dependent on the complex politics of the "band." Like Palace Brothers or Smog, Sweet Williams may have a band name but to all intents and purposes this is solo music, albeit with a stellar supporting cast of musicians when time and serendipity allows (or doesn't). House has always worked with a purposefully limited palette of sounds and stuck to the idea that the human voice and electric guitar is enough to communicate with. But for those paying close attention the change over the years has been revelatory. Sweet Williams is economical and direct. Its languid pace at first appears hard to penetrate. The immediate flavor is one of loneliness and of absence. There are no immediate "bangers," no radio hits. However, as with all of House's work, tiny moments of light welcome the listener in. The sudden warmth and beauty of "Settlement," the wild guitar solo (courtesy of Cristian of Picore) on "Old Smoke," the occasional jarring lyric to recalibrate the listening experience, Sweet Williams proves House's most melodically adventurous record to date, scattered with surprises that delight and reward.
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LP
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WAAT 062LP
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English band Sweet Williams offers grooves that warm like wine and riffs that swagger and lurch like a sailor on shore-leave. Convened by ex-Charlottefield vocalist and guitarist Thomas House and assembled from a collection of musicians whose other projects, both former and current (including those of House himself), spread like marble veins throughout the strata of the vibrant wealth of Brighton, England's alternative music scene, Sweet Williams have, since their 2011 debut album Bliss, consolidated a sound that has become ever richer and ever more compelling. The progress of that journey continued at the end of 2014 and the beginning of 2015 with the digital release of two EPs -- Two Clocks and You Might Be Singing To Yourself -- and is now more apparent than ever with Sweet Williams's second album, Please Let Me Sleep On Your Tonight. To watch the band live is to be swept up in a musical embrace that, even at its most savage and complex moments and even at its most disorientating, never feels anything less than natural and right. But that natural feeling and the infectious immediacy of the sounds belie the exquisite intricacies of the arrangements and the band's sheer hard work. Andy Thomas's head-swaying bass grinds and syncopates in lip-curl licks that entwine with the beautiful fascination and disarming power of Tom Barnes's drums to launch a tightly woven, complicated raft for the two guitars of House and Sarah Dobson to sail upon. Guitars that work at times in aggressive opposition suddenly come together in shimmering, lush accord, hanging chords upon the air before turning on a dime into sharp, murderous clamor and rage. Atop all this like a watchful hawk sit the vocals of Thomas House. Sometimes hanging back, sometimes malevolent, and always unbowed and defiant, they range from laconic, gentle utterances to unbridled, vicious howls. Recorded and mixed by Tim Cedar at Dropout Studios, Camberwell, England. Mastered by Joe Caithness. Cover art by Thomas House. Designed by Daniel Reeves. 180-gram LP in reverse-board sleeve with printed inner sleeve and download code. Edition of 500.
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