Buzzin Pop Music

Moonshot – No Sign Of Morning – album review

Moonshot: No Sign Of Morning

Moonshot (Daniel Kent and Richard Wolfe) make dark, urban music with a strong influence from 80s electronic bands and early 90s trip-hop. Their new LP No Sign Of Morning is their latest in a long line of releases – they have produced five albums and two EPs since 2001.

Moonshot’s influences include Pet Shop Boys, Massive Attack, Pink Floyd and Depeche Mode, showing their interest in making pop rooted in electronic music. No Sign Of Morning uses dark keyboards, chilly electronic drums and electronic drums to create the kind of backings associated with the likes of Tears For Fears and Duran Duran.

At times No Sign Of Morning is dance-inspired, such as on the throbbing ‘Gifted’. This is possibly the most modern that Moonshot go. Otherwise this is the music that the 80s forgot.

The vocals are staunchly earnest and their lyrics aim to be poetically psychedelic – at one point a spooky voice utters “so many gifts / watch my soul as it lifts / and shifts / and splits /and slips / upon your lips” seemingly having exhausted that particular entry in the rhyming dictionary.

The best track is probably ‘Black B’ or ‘Midnight In Dover’, which hold strong tunes and good choruses, making the most of Moonshot’s pop sensibilities – surely their strongest selling point.

Sometimes No Sign Of Morning is personal, sometimes it is topical. The dark atmospheres and narratives paint pictures of urban life in the 21st century.

No Sign Of Morning comes out on April 6th. ‘Toxic Pete’ gave them five stars. See what you think on Moonshot’s MySpace page.