The Crimea have been in the wars recently. The indie rockers were dropped by Warner Bros in 2006 after their debut album for the label, Tragedy Rocks, failed to rack up sufficient sales. Bowed, but not beaten, they’ve channelled misfortune into the creation of their finest music yet, Secrets Of The Witching Hour. The unassailable sense of self-belief that has sustained the band through troubled times is neatly conveyed by the “If we don’t believe in ourselves/Who else is there?” line on the opening ‘All Conquering’.
To hear Secrets Of The Witching Hour is to become a believer. Musically, they’ve never been so diverse, the ethereal pop of ’Loop A Loop’, the psych-rock wig-out of ‘Weird’ and the perverse Gang Of Four-meets-Granddaddy stylings of ‘Man’ paying testament to the abundance of ideas and imagination at their disposal. What’s more, they manage to fashion epic tales from everyday material, intimate scenarios instilled with the heroic bombast of Greek myth, or a sense of tragedy befitting the Bard. Throughout there is a preoccupation with Armageddon, with no less than three tracks mentioning the apocalypse.
At the centre of all this tortured introspection is Davey MacManus. The permanently pained vocalist makes for an extraordinary, albeit cracked, emotional vessel. On ‘Raining Planets’ he even manages to make the fate of working in Domino’s Pizza sound like the saddest thing in the world. Perhaps it is. They’ve lost a battle or two, but on this fighting form, The Crimea might just win the war.