The Irrepressibles are one of the most exciting, vibrant and hardest working musical acts in Britain, who make a quintessentially wonderful brand of orchestral pop.
Fronted by an outspoken campaigner for gay rights, Jamie McDermott, their recent series of Nude EPs explore the fundamentals of the human condition and race down the complex gamut of the emotional spectrum. Viscera takes us down a particularly stripped, bare and haunting – to begin with – path laced and flowered with these touches.
McDermott’s rich, reverberating voice echoes in timbre and soul across opener ‘Not Mine’, before the dramatic strings and in-the-ear breaths of ‘So’ kick in to the soundscape. ‘Raise My Soul’ races and tingles down a piano-lead spine, whilst ‘Now That My Lover is Dead’ pads and murmurs lithely through velvet-wrapped dark drums. ‘I walk to your doorway, that threatens a darkening foreplay,’ croons McDermott.
‘Pale Sweet Healing’ (the alternative version) that is one of the album’s stand-out features. Beginning with a quiet, smooth introduction, a silver build slivers into the song in the background before rising to a gorgeous blend of piano riffs and vast, epic strings. ‘Fucking Beautiful’ is a sexy, stinging tune, strummed by a dark and dirty bass, to the lyrics of seduction and lust: ‘you’re so fucking beautiful, don’t you want to tell me your name?’
And ‘Changing Time’, this short but very sweet EP’s climax, is exactly what you want from an end piece. Starting off with a bounce and colour, the continual integration and lift of instruments throughout this amazing song’s length pulls you along in its stream and just sounds – for want of a better word – happy. With the chorus ‘we’re changing time, all that’s lost but gained in time’, one wonders if it might be a reference to the recent same-sex marriage passed in England and Wales.
The Irrepressibles continue to impress and make the kind of music that anyone can appreciate but that also we, as a gay community, can be proud of. If you haven’t heard them yet, you’re advised to check out Nude: Viscera.
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