interstellar love

There are two in the control room of ColouringIN. I know next to nothing of Tom Neville, but Henry Bennett is a character I'm familiar with. A friend of friends who happen to be friends with other friends joined together by Facebook, techno, T-Bar and Hackney. The life and soul of most parties, but perhaps in this age of the bender, it's a phrase with a meaning more entwined with chemical endurance than lustre. Of Bennett, I heard a girl once at a party, "He's an absolute wanker, really fit though. You'd fuck him as long as nobody ever found out".

Why am I telling you this? Who reads this shit anyway? I'm telling you this because it gives you a handle on the boy's ambition and talent. It's beyond sky-high, it resides somewhere up in the cosmos. This winds some people up because he acts like he knows it, I couldn't really give a fuck. A lot of effort has clearly gone into this, so credit where credit's due. And who wants a boring frontman? Not me.

The tunes churned out by Neville and Bennett are delectably spacey. I would be very surprised if one of the two songs below is not on a Kitsuné Maison compilation by the end of the year. It does seem like a matter of when, not if for ColouringIN.

ColouringIN - Intergalactic Romantic (demo)


Intergalactic Romantic is beautifully crafted: if computer studios had a feature where you fold a piece of painted paper in half to make a butterfly (like when you were in primary school) this would be the result. Dirty beats and keyboards take you away from the sound of crunching feet before the classically-trained opera singer leads in with a couple of choice lines. Looping vocals (reminds me of George Michael circa Older) build up casually before the chorus, but it's the corresponding you'll find I'm not that easily impressed that is the gem. The line splinters and loops before finishing. You can't help but be impressed.

ColouringIN - Letters (demo) - exclusive stream only by request


This had me from the off. Jumps right into layered vocals. Three layers here on a bed of strings. A chorus more insistent and repetitive than Intergalactic. All about the layered vocals. Ba-dum-bah-dum.

Play these songs over and over, let them sink in. Perhaps hold off on the live show for a while. Let the anticipation build and maybe wait 6 months when these guys will be playing everywhere in venues equipped with stages and soundsystems to match their ambitions. Sweaty basement venues is not where I'd like to see romantic future music. I want to be able to hear every layer. I want to see it against a backdrop of the night sky; failing that a ridiculous stage show with props, lights, dancers, multiple costume changes, videos, aliens to just make me think for a second that I'm not in East London. No matter how much I love it, escapism is a good thing.