Band name changes can be a widespread irritant. Often they're forced upon groups for litigious reasons, sometimes they're slight changes that make sense for the newly named, say, Santigold, but not to anyone else. PVT's particular name change, however, seems functional in application. The band's two albums as Pivot, 2005's Make Me Love You and 2008's Warp debut, O Soundtrack My Heart, were slabs of drifting post-rock (the latter with minor electronic touches added because, hey, they're on Warp now) that fell short on energy throughout.
For the Australian outfit's third full-length, Church With No Magic, they've removed the vowels from their name and, almost as if as a result, chucked the bullshit "atmospherics" that have marred their discography thus far. There's a more frequent vocal presence now (supplied by multi-instrumentalist Richard Pike), and any traces of meandering instrumental passages have been ditched in favor of harsh drum programming and queasy synthesizers. You might call this brand of music "electronic rock," but that misnomer brings to mind bands like Foals, who are comparatively just a gussied up, glitch-heavy version of Coldplay when all's said and done.
Instead, PVT take a much darker route, evoking the more rhythmic elements of modern art-rock evoked by acts like These New Puritans and Liars. The video for album track "Window" allowed a window (sorry) into these guys' creative process-- samplers, computers, more samplers-- conveying in just three minutes that, yes, this is thought-intensive music. Every element exists as a piece to a larger puzzle, like Pike's nervous utterances that open the title track or the disconnected noise that jarringly emerges midway through "Crimson Swan". Remove even one snare pattern from any song here, and you'll likely be yelling "Jenga!" as the whole thing collapses from within.
Emphasizing the notion that this is brainy music would be ignoring the fact that PVT frequently achieve melodic catharsis on Church With No Magic. A lot of this is due to Pike's considerable vocal register, which can convey low resonance and high-frequency wailing alike. There's pop elements on Church With No Magic, but their integration into the band's jittery, electronically damaged sound it what makes them succeed. The aforementioned "Window" is the sole truly straightforward "pop" cut here, and although it is by no means a bad song, the simplicity of its construction can't help but make it sound slight compared to the album's more involved moments, like the oscillating tones in "Waves and Radiation" or "Timeless"' perpetually building arpeggiation. They've run out of letters to remove from their name, but PVT are just getting started when it comes to good ideas.
