Imagine (Bears and) Dragons — the Magic of The Joy Formidable’s Aaarth
A review by Peter Dysart
For several years now, The Joy Formidable have been one of the hardest working and most enjoyable bands on tour. The places they’ve toured have covered the globe and the places they’ve called home have moved as well. All along the way they’ve acquired a solid and faithful following and some lasting friendships. That exposure to different cultures, all manner of people, and a variety of landscapes surely must count as influential in how they’ve evolved and reshaped their sound. And what an incredible sound it has been.
Mind, The Joy Formidable have always been and will likely always be nothing less than a trio of brilliant musicians. And as a trio they’ve always produced an impossibly massive sound, one that fans have found irresistible. For them, it’s never been enough to rest on one sound as their signature. As artists, repetition for the sake of supporting a signature fan favourite sound has never been their aim.
With each album, they continue to change their sonic visage to fit the songs they’re writing. In the process, eschewing that single-sound approach has likely cost them bigger record deals from labels who’ve expect an easily commoditised product. But under the thumb of too many money people, you’d never hear an album of songs as powerful as this.
With the release of Aaarth, their fifth album (fourth studio), that journey of songs, sounds, stories, fans and friends reaches what is easily a new zenith. And with this new album comes one of the most incredibly conceived mixtures of sound and musical influences.
At its base, the essence of this album is made up of ballads and other common song forms. Indeed, stripped down, many of the songs have simply vocal-based canvases and hook ladened melodies. But in replacing the simple primary colours you’d expect to hear from the rock palette, they’ve replaced them with a curious and ingeniously mind-bending mixtures of sonic savouries far more appealing than the bare hook. It would be difficult to describe any of this as experimental or explorative, and far easier to paint it as deftly experiential. Many of these sound mixtures match the composition underneath and feel thoroughly measured and tested. That isn’t to say there wasn’t ample experimentation in the album’s development. But that mind-bending and transformative mixture is always a pleasing one.
As stated already, this is a band with many homes and exposures. Aaarth delivers an amazing pan-global array of crafted noises. The Better Me is a perfect example of this. Opening with what sound like a Martin-era late-Beatles psychedelic string quartet passage, it’s immediately overlaid with a 50s scifi raygun lead guitar that squonks out octave bouncing beams of paralysing energy. This is followed in parallel with a dirty bass riff that continues along with the lovely vocal harmonies to drive the first stanza. Then, on the chorus, the lead guitar switches to a western slide guitar for extra flavour. This mixture of psychedelia, electronic, and western sounds swirl to paint all the colours of a dusty desert landscape — complete with a wavy hot mirage transforming a nearby peyote flower. Then suddenly the chorus is blasted away by a massive fuzzed out bridge of metal noise that blew out my preamp on first listen.
Welcome to the next iteration of Joy Formidable. It’s an album full of strong ethno-tribal vibes that flow through both sides of the record, pulling you into a kinetic boomerang to dance around the globe in search of sonic pleasures. And in case it goes unnoticed in the album’s fascinating artwork, it also spans the temporal bridge to ancient times and long forgotten mythologies to join the two brothers, Enki and Enlil, as they descend to battle on earth. Enter Marduk, Tiamat, and in one incredible transformation the album is infused with dragons as well as bears. Bears, you ask? They’re in the inventive Welsh album title.
The first track sung in Welsh, Y Bluen Eria, instantly opens up the portal to the imagination that invites listeners into what is a deep and satisfying sonic journey. The song starts with the jolt of repeating staccato vocal sample that bounces into an arcane and mysterious incantation before Matt lays down what will be the song’s heavy ritual beat. The guitars and bass complete the rhythmic bounce. The effect is powerfully dark as swirling hypnotic and psychedelic sounds carry the listener away in a flurry.
Aaarth is full of intrigues like this, daring fans to disavow and defy simple classifications. It’s an effort requiring multiple and focused listens. It’s also an album dotted with will also be some very happy hits. The first of these is the bouncy vocal-driven ballad, The Wrong Side, which takes time to build each verse as it runs through a variety of trippy sonic filters before lifting us up high at through a sustained chorus. Stripped down to only guitar and vocals, this song would be a gorgeous hit, but the addition of new sounds and one of the wildest lead guitar riffs help to create one of the album’s many purely magical experiences. Dance of the Lotus delivers a similar though heavier experience. In particular on The Wrong Side, the unifying element on this track is Matt Thomas’s brilliant contrapuntal drum work, syncing up verse to chorus to provide the perfect balance to guitars and lead vocals. In fact, his brilliance is on display throughout the entire album.
Go Loving continues with heavy trance-laden guitar riffs and a maddening beat. But this only sets the table for one of the albums strongest tracks. Cicada (Land on your Back), brings in Andalusian and Moorish influences with Spanish guitar and swaying vocal harmonies that stretch across yet another lazy hot desert landscape until the song explodes with mixture of utterly filthy and nasty guitar riffs.
Nestled among the heavy sounds is All In All, which begins as a quiet lullaby adrift in a sea of memories. But it’s not too long that the winds pick up and a repeating lyrical phrase eventually builds up to a swirling maelstrom of guitar sounds that crash down around us. While it’s not uncommon to find a genuinely touching song mixed in with a Joy Formidable albums, it’s usually an unexpected and singular moment from Ritz’s lyric or a guitar passage from Rhydian that makes you wipe an eye, forget where you are, and make you think wistfully on your own circumstance.
But there’s no time for rest as the next song suddenly pulls into a rodeo on What For. Aaarth is wild ride from end to end, dominating, and never giving you much room to catch your breath. In fact, it’s exhausting as a full listen. Not even the slower songs like Absence are really a time to relax. The penultimate song the album is the highly emotional You Can’t Give Me, which is the simply the icing on this delicious cake. While this reviewer has frequently been too close for objectivity, it doesn’t require that much distance to realise what a monster of an album this is. Given today’s disposable, consumable music scene, Aaarth is exactly the deep listen that many of us have been hoping for.
Aaarth lands in record stores on 28 September and look for The Joy Formidable on tour starting this Friday for four UK dates and twenty more in the States. Tickets and dates can be found here.
