At Play In Borley Rectory

Album review
By Chris Long
Producer, BBC Manchester Introducing

On the reverse of God's Little Eskimo's debut, it states that he's 'channelled the voices of the dead' to create it.

If that weren't startling enough, his method of channelling is through instruments like the musical saw, wine glasses and a radiator.

So it comes as a surprise to find that on listening, the resulting album is not a weird affair, but a sturdy collection of new folk, albeit a far leftfield one.

Layering sound on sound, voice on voice, instrument on instrument, he builds ten deliciously enchanting songs that carry a wealth of intrigue from the sparse, spectral opening of Diving Into Ash to The Sea Shall Not Have Them's looping closer.

Between them, Forgotten Maps Forgotten Languages drives through a bony beat, Penguin Eggs heads off towards a glockenspiel-painted and oddly inspirational horizon, Who's That Calling Your Name? see-saws across an autoharp and At The Base Of Her Spine has all the punch of the unexpected return of a long-forgotten lover.

Top of the pile, the shake and rattle of In Salute Of The Body reveals a pop heart lurking in the undertow of the album.

It's deeply whimsical stuff, coming from the same fanciful place that fuelled Twisted Nerve's first releases, but it is also enormous fun, and while it might not be as supernatural as its premise suggests, there's enough to it to haunt you long after it has left your stereo.

At Play In Borley Rectory is out on ArtScare Records.