I Believe in the Way You Move

Recently firing your one and only employee tends to leave you rather behind schedule, but that's not really a valid excuse since I've been a bit late with my postings the last few weeks anyway... It's just been quite hectic...

So I'm a day late and maybe a bit late with only finding out about Jeremy Warmsley now.

I stumbled across his name when I read up on the new Shins single Australia getting released in the UK with some covers for b-sides, one of which is Girl Inform Me reinterpreted by my young half-Frenchman of the hour, Mr. Warmsley.


24 Years of age, a singer and songwriter and producer from London, way ahead of many of his peers I might add, released his debut album The Art of Fiction in the UK & Ireland in 2006 on Transgressive Records and now this month on Rykodisc for the rest of Europe.

Most of his stuff sounds like the creation of some weird mythic being with the heads of The Decemberists' Colin Meloy and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah's Alec Ounsworth up in the clouds all aloof with thoughts of love no more and relationships.

Songs like the splendid (well I presume single) Dirty Blue Jeans sounds exactly like that but adds in some Final Fantasy strings and changes face like he was the puppet master behind The Unicorns' damn catchy quirkiness. All of that yes, is rather much to take in, and I Promise pretty much embodies the same but for some reason reminds me of Suburban Kids with Biblical Names as well... If they were in actual fact recording and producing their music in the States, with two heads that luckily fit through the doorway leading to the booth.

A Matter of Principle on the other hand is terribly misleading... Though it did stand out a little when I first heard it... It starts off with beautiful 15 seconds of Do Make Say Think maybe Mice Parade guitar before picking it's way over some beautifully produced beats. There's a lot of screwing around with pretty much every single track and sound in the mix. It's something that either one of the collective minds behind Pinback might conceive of in some other side project... And the little synth-meets-harpsichord-under-water sounding bridge-a-ma-jig is just way cool. The chorus if you can call it that, well lyrically at least, focuses on the line I made you a gift of the sea and it's a summary of a sad yet sweet lament of promises not met or kept. The lyrics paint the pretty pictures in your head to fill in the gaps that I can't avoid right now... Well 'cept for the You pinned your hopes on my donkey's back line... That kinda messed with my head in it's fragile state.

Get it, play it, like it:

Dirty Blue Jeans
I Promise
A Matter of Principle
+ MYSPACE

Note: When you play track 1 and 2 make sure you have no gaps between them k?

My mind is in the gutter
But I'm looking up the skirts of the stars
You wouldn't get it

- Ri.