The success of 2007’s Fleetwood Mac-referencing The Trials Of Van Occupanther saw Midlake knocking on the door of the mainstream. But the Denton, Texas band turned their back on commercial success with follow up album The Courage Of Others, in which they tapped obscure early ‘70s British folk, whilst marinading their music in such proggy trappings as three-part flute solos and lyrics that came perilously close to referencing The Wind In The Willows.
The dangers of so drastic a turnabout were laid bare when the seven-piece visited Dublin at the start of the year, when highlights from Occupanther sat uncomfortably beside fatuous, flaccid excerpts from the new record. Those that were there say their summer concert supporting Grizzly Bear under a big tent in Cork was equally underwhelming.
On a stormy evening in the capital, however, there is evidence that the group, led by the shaggy mopped Tim Smith, have finally found a way of combining these twin aspects of their sound. Mostly, in fact, the transition from Occupanther to Courage is seamless and the self-indulgent longueurs that rendered their earlier shows such a drag are largely missing (the flute solos, for one thing, are scaled back considerably).
Instead, the group did a convincing job of making you feel you’d been sucked backwards in time and were witnessing some forgotten early ‘70s West Coast rock band at their peak: ‘We Gathered In Spring’ conjures the moss-rimmed spirit of Appalachia, while ‘Roscoe’ - essentially the theme from M*A*S*H recorded in the style of Rumours – is divinely craggy. Even the Courage cuts (‘Children Of The Grounds’, ’Winter Dies’) had a freshly-acquired spring in their gait.
Rock music currently suffers from an excess of backwoods-attired bands apparently under the impression it’s still 1977 (Fleet Foxes, Avett Brothers, The Duke And The King). Midlake are as in hock to the cliché as anyone else – but when the results sound this divine, who’s in the mood for quibbling?