MEMORYHOUSE - The Slideshow Effect

How often does it happen that we look at an old photo of ourselves and feel a strong nostalgia for times gone by, for the hopes and dreams we nurtured back then, or, on the contrary, recall how hard those moments were, when everything really did seem so difficult.

And then there are shots that tell the story of first loves, portraits of faces smiling and happy to be together, couples or friendships that perhaps no longer exist now but that still live on indelibly in our memory.

All these melancholic emotions are very much present in the music of Memoryhouse, the Ontario duo who sparked so much curiosity back in 2011 with their debut EP "The Years", and who now prove their compositional and interpretive quality over the long distance too with the commendable "The Slideshow Effect".

The title is more fitting than ever in describing the atmospheres that define it, namely musical slides that can make the heart flutter for anyone who can still be moved by languid guitar effects and by a voice, that of Denise Nouvion, capable of being expressive and deeply involved when singing about personal insecurities and relationships that have ended but still live on inside her.

The band, initially born as a sonic commentary to the photographs and works of multi-talented musician and artist Evan Abeele, leads us into a world where sadness and sweetness coincide, much as Beach House have done so well in recent times, another home to retreat to when everything outside seems truly dreadful.

The CD, accompanied by a beautiful booklet featuring lyrics and softly grained photographs, the work of Nouvion herself, depicting landscapes, architecture, shades of light and the two artists themselves in half-shadow, consists of ten tracks opened by the ballad "Little Expressionless Animals", very hushed, almost like a lullaby sung with tears in one's eyes, followed by one of the most dynamic songs of the bunch, "The Kids Were Wrong", which lifts the mood higher, at least sonically.

But it's the third track, "All Our Wonder", that wins the prize for the album's most accomplished song, above all thanks to a guitar that traces lines somewhere between Cocteau Twins and Red House Painters and, most of all, a chorus that imprints itself immediately in the mind, with the tender Denise Nouvion repeating: "No more silence in me" until she's spent. If this is the ideal song to approach Memoryhouse's music, "Kinds Of Light" falls only slightly short, where the six-string is much more in a romantic Robert Smith vein, while the vocal delivery seems to make room for disillusionment even in the singing, since love is no longer about sharing but about suffocation, a kind of surrender after walking together for so long without ever getting anywhere.

But disappointment certainly won't strike the listener, who will instead find in Memoryhouse a worthy musical companion for those precious moments of intimacy.

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21/02/2012