Rotterdam-based Lewsberg presents to the market the follow-up to their 2018 self-titled debut. Released on their-own Cargo Record Distribution label, In This House needs little introduction other than to say “Wow!” – This is the freshest take on The Velvet Underground circa 1967 I have heard and as many will know, this was a time of the band’s debut Velvet Underground & Nico, an album that failed to garner positive acclaim at the time yet would go on to become known as one of the most influential albums of all-time. The music-buying public seems more open-minded these days and willing to accept records of the avant-garde, so In This House could well become the next left-field hit of this decade. Without a doubt, this is one of the most engaging albums I have heard of late, with its twangy slightly out of tune guitars, a rhythm that sees no sign of stopping and lyrics that explore subjects of suicide and emotional void, yet is every bit as compelling, as is the need to understand what the vocalists are saying. Just like the viewing audience would approach a TV drama like Killing Eve, with an almost narcotic need to experience the next episode.
An album whose content feels exceptionally loose, yet with an obvious direction, the ever riding guitar and the vocalist’s European-English failing to detract from a song’s obvious quality. This album seems a more learned affair than their debut, possessing an urgency, whilst still having the space to squeeze in more downbeat numbers like ‘At Lunch‘, stating that from the protagonist’s standpoint, “I always drink at lunchtime” while on the next, ‘Trained Eye‘, his drunken afternoon might be expressed in the woozy haze of guitar. Then to ‘From Never to Once‘, a wonderful bloom of broken-English, sentences that don’t seem to express that someone living in a glass house should never throw stones in quite the correct manner, complete with jaunty guitar, pulling this number on to its conclusion. A little further on, on ‘Through the Garden‘, lines like “that’s what Jenny said before she blew her head off…” emerge from the vocalist’s palate and, from the same song, “Miranda was a dirty girl, so what?, I met her in the men’s room once, so what?, she washed her hands, she put her pants on, as she ran straight back to the mud“, all add to the macabre humour present throughout, before once again diving into a guitar solo that is every bit as good as anything Sterling Morrison might’ve produced. Simply this is quite an outstanding album, with not just a nod to the past, but a glance at the future and for this band, a truly profitable one creatively must surely await.
In This House is released on 27th March through Cargo Record Distribution.
