When The Light First Fell

“Do you remember the day I begged you to put down that blood-filled syringe?/And you were oh so proud of how close you were from coming off your hinges…” Arresting opening lines from Martin Connor – a Mancunian-Irish songwriter dreaming out loud through his soaring suburban hymns where you can nearly feel the grey sheets of rain falling on the streets of Manchester.

Previously, Connor wrote music under the guise of The Love Gods – a well loved, highly acclaimed if unfortunately obscure outfit. His sister Mary and henchmen Higgs and Mike Moss re-join him for a grisly but uplifting jaunt through some of the finest and saddest points about life, death, addiction, love and hate. Their honest jangly pop recalls the dark beauty of The La’s and Shack, as they share that relentless drive for truth and that magical knack for turning dreary urbane rituals into poetic paeans to everyday life. Lilting sax and piano codas add a little more sparkle and colour in all the right places – lending When the Light First Fell a disorientating and slightly snazzy late-night touch.

While Connor’s voice suffers slightly from a lack of variety of tone over an entire album, this is a solid and promising collection from a band teetering slowly but surely towards something quite unique.