“It’s the orchestra that make this record, though. There’s something wonderfully homespun about the sound of Clocks that captures both a professional sheen and the sound of musicians recording in a living room. One might say it sounds “British” in the way it evokes images of sun and clouds against rolling hills (“Clocks, Part 2”) and the quietness of a slow-paced village at night (opening track “Clocks, Part 3,” which sounds peaceful at one moment before eluding to the sound of someone – let’s say a clockmaker for the hell of it – working away into the small hours) – but it’s more than that. Clocks is something of a tapestry, bringing together tales from different trains of thoughts and weaving them together to create a single piece. Like a tapestry, it’s got history embedded in it (“Josefina,” which asks “In your one hundred years, what you will see?”), some folklore (Gordon MacIntyre reels of a tale of a community full of characters in his pleasing Scottish drawl on “East Coast”), and something undeniably personal (closing track “Pightle 21,” which arguably stays slightly too long, but is still lovely). It’s the little things that make Clocks a pleasure, and A Little Orchestra prove that the small things in life are just as important and wonderful as everything else.”
Clocks by A Little Orchestra is now available to buy on CD or digital download from our Bandcamp page, from our label Vollwert Records in Berlin, or, if you live in Japan, at this formerly Shibuya-based online stockist.
