Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Jade Imagine, Milk Records/Remote Control 2019.
A few weeks ago I reviewed Jade Imagine’s new EP You Remind Me Of Something I Lost and promised to review their album Basic Love.
Basic Love is the debut full length offering from one of Melbourne’s best up-and-coming bands.
Very few bands these days have the confidence to strip back what they do to the bare bones, preferring instead to hide behind multi-layered instrumentation that hides the beauty of the original song idea.
Jade Imagine, on the other hand, make the spacious and elemental their signature sound, and I love it.
I find myself transported back to the experimental period of the 1960’s with a lot of their songs where the creation of soundscapes that provide the requisite atmosphere is fundamental to the vision.
A song like Past Life for example has large passages that are dominated by bass and drums before a steadily building synth adds to the mood.
It’s this audio simplicity, and the confidence to go with it, that I applaud.
Another clever choice was the decision to record the album live and to use analogue instruments where possible.
There is a warmth to analogue that can’t be fully replicated digitally.
Basic Love is a gentle and dreamy album, one that demands that you don’t treat it as background music.
It’s an album that deserves your attention.
There are many surprises.
Liam ‘snowy’ Halliwell’s lovely melodic bass is a treat to enjoy throughout the album, the sudden injection of brass into Don’t Say It’s Over surprises, the interesting lyrics that are constantly juxtaposing opposites and the mesmerising music make this album memorable.
Jade Imagine’s music is about dreams and imagination and their musical approach makes them quite unique.
They are definitely a band to explore.
