If, upon hearing this album, it proves difficult for you to get past the fact that Gaggle are a 21-member all-female choir, I won’t be too surprised. After all, some have marked that out as Gaggle’s ‘thing’. They’re far more than that, though: ‘From the Mouth of the Cave’ is one of the most thrillingly inventive debut albums to come out of London, or for that matter, anywhere, for quite a while. It sounds absolutely nothing like you’d expect, laughing in the face of presumptions and revelling in its oddness.
The album certainly is odd: lead single ‘Army of Birds’ was their stab at making a pop song, yet despite it sounding like it’s cut from completely different cloth than the titular, brooding album opener (a song which takes a while to make its mark, but eventually delivers an astonishingly powerful finish) or the bass-and-percussion-driven ‘Power of Money’ (as the name would suggest, it is a timely reflection on the economic crisis), it seems to slot in perfectly. If anything, Gaggle’s ‘thing’ is that they can craft an album that simultaneously sounds like it’s all over the place and like it has an entirely singular vision.
Diversity is their calling card. It’s hard to believe that the time signature-juggling intensity of ‘Happy is the Country’ and the extraordinary tribal pop of ‘Gaslight’ (which once again features prominent, stomping rhythms) have both been created by the same collective, which is to say nothing of the psychedelic freak-out interlude ‘Congo’, which seems to shift the album towards a slightly more accessible path, as it is followed by the impressively melodic, layered, almost Liars-esque ‘Bang on the Drum’; ‘Crows’ is the kind of song to leave a lasting imprint on the mind long after it has ended.
By this point, the band’s intense work may leave the listener feeling a little drained, but the nakedly accessible penultimate track ‘Hello Spider’ provides some form of respite before the dark and unsettling waltz of ‘Leave the City’ closes the album in a typically uncompromising fashion. Gaggle aren’t making music for anyone but themselves, and the result is a bracing debut that has something for everyone and, no doubt, will have everything for someone.
From the Mouth of the Cave is released next week on Transgressive.
Posted by Gareth O’Malley
