Frankie Sparo — Welcome Crummy Mystics

The curtains are drawn. Light falls on stage among shadows; the silhouette of a piano crouches in the limelight. A man appears from the left, followed by other musicians. They pick up their instruments: guitar, violin, contrabass, trumpet... Around the drums are various percussion accessories, gadgets and machines. A music box stands on top of a black synthesizer.

This is what I see when I listen to this album. Unfortunately, I've never seen the band live, but this album is just short of the tinkling of Single Malt glasses from having that true cabaret atmosphere. Welcome Crummy Mystics continues in the path first travelled on Arena Hostile but the arrangements are more expansive and varied. The EP had the advantage of brevity, this album has length on its side; no two songs occupy the same sonic space, textures change all the time: Here's a choir energetically singing "Bah Bah Bah!" on the song "Back On Speed", there's an instrumental passage where piano and clean electric guitar play a duet in a dark room (I can only assume) with echoing walls. A beautiful lullaby sung in French called "Caméra" makes sense total sense alongside dissonant guitars and out of tune singing. The mood of the album can be summarized by this line taken from a hypnotic bass-drone piece that turns into a piano jazz tune: "My sister warned me/when you get old you get empty." The album may only be 37 odd minutes long, but it's enough for Mr. Sparo to stretch in a way that he could not before, neither on the last EP nor on his first album (although for different reasons).

To hell with the conclusion paragraph, this review is fine the way it is.

A fine album from a fine artist.