As one of the major players in the UK's original shoegaze scene, along with groups such as Slowdive, Lush, and Ride, Cranes were one of the first rock bands to put the dreary seaside town of Portsmouth on the musical map. A series of high-profile shows in 1992 supporting the Cure on a world tour opened the gates to a wider audience, and their appeal began to stretch through to the goth community, especially to fans of the dreamier echelons (This Mortal Coil, Dead Can Dance). Since 1997, the group-- led by brother and sister Jim and Alison Shaw-- has taken intermittent breaks; the release of Future Songs in 2001 was followed by a live album, and then their most recent full-length, Particles and Waves, appeared in 2004.
Cranes' last two albums signified a musical shift by extending their interest in glimmering electronic melodies and more gently contemplative song structures, eschewing the distortion-driven dissonance and upfront drumbeats of past recordings. Their self-titled ninth studio album continues this keyboard-focused pattern. Taken as a whole, the songs are stronger and more coherent than those on Particles and Waves and inhabit a more elusive and intriguing space. On tracks such as "Feathers" and "Wires", the guitar work remains delicate in tone, and slides with casual grace into the lovely pulse of the keyboard motif, creating a mysterious swirl of stripped-down beauty. Listening to it feels like walking into dark forest, finding an ancient music box buried under a pile of moss, and watching the ballerina inside pivot to an awkward interior clockwork. The metaphor is reinforced by the brilliant artwork featuring dandelion skeletons peeking through a dense midnight blue, lyrics about long walks and changing weather pressure, and the wintry landscape painting the recording.
Alison Shaw's love-it-or-hate-it voice remains a constant presence in the band's ever-evolving sound, right down to the suitably thin, reverb-washed production. "Unique" doesn't do justice: She has a decidedly childlike cadence, and while some might argue that her vocals complemented Cranes' intense earlier sound better than the more recent material, her singing is the most definitive quality of the band and serves to give their music an edge. Without it, Cranes might veer toward the easy glide of the Sea and Cake discography and would verge on being a little too smooth and carefully trodden. On "Move Along", Shaw is at her best, as she breathes life into the sparse melancholy that ebbs and flows like the sea she describes.
While Cranes will not offer many surprises to longtime fans, its focus seems to be on the theme of searching for something, and it communicates this feeling with a persuasiveness that continues to build right through to the end. From the crystal-clear droplets of electronic glitches that form the delightful instrumental opening track, "Diorama", to the final song "High and Low", which comes to a close with the wistful mantra "Where's the place between high and low?/ Maybe one day I'll know/ I've still got a long way to go", one gets the feeling that Cranes are on a path that will keep them rising to the challenges they set for themselves.
