Review Summary: “Now I love, and will love. But do not be afraid of too much expression on my part.”
The Yorkshire moors are famous, at least in literature. They are wet, hilly, and sparsely populated, all of which makes them a perfect setting for… whatever psychological drama writers wish to explore, really. Fragrant, gnarly shrubs as far as the eye can see, and a relentless, never ceasing gale, you just never know when you might bump into Heathcliff or any of the other Brontë cast. And, since 2017, the area has their own Techno Brontë as well: Craven Faults. But this Yorkshireman does not stop at depicting the awesome powers of nature found in the northern UK or the internal turmoil of the protagonist. His second full length,
Standers, also explores the effects of the first industrial revolution, or, in his own words, “the heavy industry that’s grown up around the mouth of the river, stands out in this ancient landscape”. In that sense, you could say his work is more akin to Gaskell’s
North and South than to
Wuthering Heights. It seems C. Faults found a way around the struggles of Gaskell’s heroine, Margaret Hale, when she exclaimed: “Oh, I can’t describe my home. It is home, and I can’t put its charm into words”. The end product of his descriptive work was released today.
What Craven Faults has delivered here is first and foremost an incredible work of slowly evolving, brooding, introspective techno that manages to be both hypnotizing, yet which can easily withstand active listening. And, indeed, there is a taste of coal smoke in the air. In Craven Faults’ view, the pristine moors go hand in hand with the stamping fulling mills and cotton factories that Miss (no spoilers) Hale has first-hand experience with. That is not to say this record is Victorian in any sense. Cyclic washes of analogue synths and lovingly crafted beat patterns come at you from all sides, recalling (according to the man himself) a “journey across northern Britain, viewed through the lens of a century in popular music”. I, personally, do not entirely hear how this recalls the past century in pop, but this thing surely confers a deliciously introspective state of mind. Is that entirely what he was after? I don’t know, nor do I care. I just press play, lay down in the wet heathland, staring into the grey overcast sky, and let it all wash over me.
