Product Description

'Through The Windowpane' is the debut album from London based avant-popsters known as Guillemots. Fusing elements of early REM with some of Bjork's mellower moments, the band takemore traditonal indie rock elements somewhere new and refreshing without forgetting to take the melodies with them. Includes the singles 'Made Up Love Song #43' and 'Trains To Brazil'.

Track Listing

1. Little Bear
2. Made-Up Lovesong #43
3. Trains To Brazil
4. Redwings
5. Come Away With Me
6. Through The Windowpane
7. If The World Ends
8. We're Here
9. Blue Would Still Be Blue
10. Annie, Let's Not Wait
11. And If All...
12. Sao Paulo

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3078 in Music
• Released on: 2006-07-10
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Enhanced
• Running time: 60 minutes

Amazon.co.uk
There's no doubting the ambitions of Through The Window Pane. Its makers, London's Guillemots might be able to trace their roots back to the indie underground – like so many, frontman Fyfe Dangerfield got his musical break when his former band recorded a John Peel session – but this is a debut that owes nothing to angry abrasiveness or wilfully leftfield tactics. Diverse, subtle, and commendably understated – see the opening "Little Bear", five minutes of near silence interrupted only by gentle strings, lounge piano, and Dangerfield’s soft, operatic vocal – this is an album seemingly diametrically opposed to the voguish all-mouth, no-trousers school of modern indie. "Made-Up Love Song 43" combines tearful, emo-tinged balladry with sped-up vinyl wobble, heavenly vocal choirs, and distant accordion, while the spacey "A Samba In The Snowy Rain" confirms Guillemots luxuriate with the sort of progressive rock nous that should see their name mentioned next to the likes of Sigur Rós or Mew. It's not all bombastic – "Blue Would Still Be Blue" is comparatively restrained, Dangerfield's impressive range hitched to spare keyboard blips. But as "Sao Paolo" builds from swinging piano ballad to horns-powered prog symphony over eleven fireworks-packed minutes, there's no denying that in the world of Guillemots, bigger is definitely better. –-Louis Pattison

Customer Reviews

Under the radar for too long.
I only discovered the Guillemots earlier this year, and had actually never heard of them previously. I now know what I was missing.

This is a fantastic album; I love the addition of big band music with the more familiar, expected instruments. It's a sound in its own league with lyrics which actually have coherency, depth and meaning; a welcome change these days.

Overall, it's very relaxing, and ambient in style in some songs. Vocally, it sounds a little like David Gray, but in terms of instrumentals it reminds me of Nitin Sawhney to an extent. Both of which are compliments.

A very modest, understated, underrated album which I am glad to have stumbled accross.

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No, man, I shouldn't like this as much as I do. I know this. Yet, considering I've spent the last few years of my life rallying against Britain's acceptance of Hard-Fi and Razorlight as the voice of my generation, I feel Guillemots were a dim light in the bleak, pitch black vacuum of modern not-actually-indie indie rock. This band, and this album, existed on the cusp of mainstream acceptance at the time of its release, and it should have been a revolution. All the stars were alligned; it was up for a Mercury Prize (but lost out to The Arctic Monkeys, 'cause, ya know, they needed more hype...), had the backing of the Pitchforkian forces that drive the minds of so many hipsters and, hell, this band even featured on some BBC2 program that was on after Paxman had finished bemoaning the recently-added weather section of his Newsnight show. My mind is blurred, but I believe these things happened at around the same time.

Guillemots should've been the band to break the country out of its wholesale love of the bland, mundane and uninspired. "...nothing on the radio that means that much to me"; really, Johnny Borrell, you odious twatrocker? I realise you've had Kirsten Dunst, but that doesn't give you the right to pen such hypocritical nonsense. You're part of the problem, Borrell, and you're the reason why Guillemots only slightly made it. At the very least, you owe Fyfe Dangerfield a pint, at the very best, well, how good is your knowledge when it comes to seppuku?

This should've worked. The glorious "Made Up Love Song #43" runs deep with pretentionless sentiment to what every songwriter wants to experience, if only to write a song about it. "Trains to Brazil" was, in the past, the future number one single. It even has whistles and kids voices in it, which is just the icing on this golden cake of a song. Number 36, people; that's where this charted, and you have only yourselves to blame. The strings on "We're Here" should belong on a Disney film, yet they fit perfectly in this weightless ballad of nothing. The title track even manages to venture near the crazy world of techno, yet the whole thing is still drenched in Guillemot sauce. "And if All", even if it is just a throwaway prelude to the closer, is still a stunning ambient piece when listened to alone (I once had this on repeat for like half an hour)...

"Sao Paulo"... no words.

In absolutely no way should this have changed the world, yet Guillemots' debut should've been the start of something great. And, yes, I realise that this is a completely incoherent rant that tails off madly towards the end, but sometimes I just really, really hate people.

Give it time
This is a classic 'grower'. For those (like me) whose expectations were primed by the singles, it can take a bit of adjustment before the real beauty of this album starts to kick in. In place of catchy pop hooks and predictable song structures you get expansive soundscapes and detailed arrangements that reward repeated listening. And after a surfeit of bands recreating the 70's, it's a change to hear a group with influences rooted in the 80's, but with some sobering and reflective post-7/7 lyrics that alternate between despair and defiance. Well worth spending some time with.