the leaves

breathe

‘Ambient shoegazer dream pop. Think Sigur Ros. Think Coldplay or Radiohead. Think Bjork and the Sugarcubes. This is what you get when you dissect Leaves.

Now add up Leaves, Sigur Ros, Bjork and the Sugarcubes and ask yourself: Are Icelandic bands some of the most talented musicians in the world or what?

Be careful. Something awfully suspicious is going on over there. It’s relatively quiet and then, out of nowhere, a new musical act appears that proves American music to fall in the quantity and not quality category.

“Breathe,” the Leaves’ Dreamworks debut, is a solid 13-track album that proves its worth with every listen. The benefit is, the more you listen, the more the band distinguishes itself from its contemporaries.

The vocal comparisons to Coldplay’s Chris Martin are inescapable, but a close listen to “Breathe” will have the listener following the plight of the guitar through its long and labor-intensive journey. It wails in pain. It beckons for attention. Metaphorically speaking, it plays the role of the tortured soul and it accomplishes this task better than the vocals themselves.

In the mix, the guitar is equally represented but can get lost in the musical melee. Be sure and keep an ear out for it.