Dead Letter Chorus

DEAD LETTER CHORUS
Issue 1020
The August Magnificent (Code One/MGM)

Take enough twang to comfortably wear the cowboy hat and spurs of country. Drag it urgently down a bleak and moody path of emo/post-punk morbid fascination, and then rescue it with coquettish balladry and triumphant choruses. Top it all off with a big hunk of energetic Aussie self-produced indie credibility and you have a record that is simply massive. On their first tilt at a full-length release, Dead Letter Chorus have managed all of this and more to produce an album of sprawling majesty and epic intensity. The type of album you don’t just need to hear… you need to inhabit.

The August Magnificent gets much of its scale from the emotional range of singers Cameron Potts and Gabrielle Huber. Alternating vocal duties either between songs or between verses, Potts and Huber each shift seamlessly from charm to menace to world-weariness and back again, turning each track into its own emotional journey. Even the corny lyrics on the shuffling hoedown of Magnolia Farm, which include ‘you can be the flower, I will be your stem’, are somehow elevated from cheese to charm.

Matching the singing for range, the music is breathtaking. The constantly shifting instrumental dynamics of the album come courtesy of the orchestration of the five band members and no less than 22 guest musicians. It’s a careful blend of reckless abandon and control that frequently empowers but never overwhelms.

But despite the abundance of instrumentation, the must-hear show stopper would have to be Modern Faith. An acoustic rendering of a conversation with God, Modern Faith calls to mind the poetry, lyricism and humble musicianship of the great balladeers of bygone eras.

Not just a great debut, an outstanding album by any measure. Buy it. Listen to it. Live inside it.

Troy Foster
- Rip It Up Magazine

The August Magnificent by Dead Letter Chorus
4 1/2 Stars

There is an almost ostentatious confidence flowing through this debut album from the Sydney five-piece. Several of their songs, most notably the dramatically titled and played The Peaceful Sleep of Death, have an epic quality. With 22 guest musicians (including a 10-piece mini-orchestra and a nine-piece choir) that is hardly surprising, though. While those moody tunes build up with intense arrangements, at other times they sound like a completely different band with more direct acoustic folk-country romps.

Paul Smith
- The Sydney Morning Herald

DEAD LETTER CHORUS?The August Magnificent?(Code One/MGM)
4 Stars

?Dead Letter Chorus are an outstanding quintet concocting a unique combination of indie, folk and country. Their self-produced debut LP The August Magnificent offers 12 tracks of moving music accompanied, at times, by a 10-piece orchestra and a 9-piece choir.?

On spooky opener ‘The Peaceful Sleep of Death’ Cameron Potts’s echoing vocals belt out a series of melancholy lyrics such as, “Just take me down tonight to the peaceful sleep of death” and these sentiments, along with wailing guitar solos and a string section, give the track a dark and almost sinister feel. This song immediately contrasts with ‘Magnolia Farm’, a simple, country love song with lyrics such as, “You can be the painter and I will be your wall”. The next tracks, ‘Down In Your Hearts’ and ‘Chasing Hearts’, are more reminiscent of slow indie rock, yet are fused with a slight country twang.

Then there are the epic ballads – ‘Fight The Morning’, ‘11th Dream About Aeroplanes’ and ‘The Long Goodnight’ are desperate and moving stories of love and life. Dead Letter Chorus execute each of these styles with integrity and talent and, amazingly, make them sound not the slightest bit cliché, but rather original and poignant.

?The vocals of Gabrielle Huber (somewhat similar to that of Martha Wainwright) and Cameron Potts, complement each other perfectly and both have a depth and range which allows them to work easily in each of the different styles, forming the common denominator which draws the songs together.?

The August Magnificent is a completely engrossing hour. It’s dark and moving but also cute and happy, featuring both simplistic songs and complex orchestral pieces, all done with such style and grace that it manages to make country sound cool.?

Emma Heard - Time Off Magazine

A lovely single from The August Magnificent, written and sung by Gabrielle Huber, whose voice is clipped in parts and resonant in others - a remarkably beautiful sound that flirts with the gymnastics of Kate Bush and Tori Amos, but remains sweet and to the point. The song soars beautifully around her, a lush flower of baroque folk.

Beat Magazine
- Beat Magazine

Wait a minute. This isn’t Aussie metal! It’s indie, and folky and there’s not a thing here that makes me want to crank the volume and dance like a nut bar. Oh, I get it... Dead Letter CHORUS, not Dead Letter Circus. All sarcasm aside, how hard is it for one of these bands to change their name? Really! Not all consumers are as switched on as me, so surely there are some indie kids out there who have had a horrible shock, and some metal lovers who have probably been shocked even more by a confusion that is a very easy mistake to make.

Having almost been fooled on more than one occasion by the similarity of names, and already being a ‘Circus fan, I decided to launch a pre-emptive strike and check out Dead Letter Chorus’s debut album The August Magnificent so that I’d be well prepared in the event that I turned up at the wrong gig. Should that happen, I’m now convinced that worse things could happen. This debut album is strong and well-executed by these self-proclaimed shoe-gazers, and, for those with a penchant for the softer side of music, it is an overly enjoyable aural experience.

At over six minutes, opening track The Peaceful Sleep Of Death fits into the same vein of rolling epic that wouldn’t be out of place on an evermore album. There’s some beautiful orchestral backing here, strongly guided by drummer Lee Carey, and Cameron Potts’ vocals are top notch. This easily sets the pace for the following tracks, embracing a collection of heart-wrenching ballads (Fathers and Daughters), some alt-country driving songs (Magnolia Farm, a gorgeous duet between Potts and Gabrielle Huber) and music to fall in love to (Down In Your Valley).

In a similar vein to perhaps Angus and Julia Stone or George, tracks are divvied up between Cameron Potts and Gabrielle Huber, with each taking the reins and making the songs they lead wholly their own. Potts’ tunes tend to be more guitar driven and Huber’s more piano, by virtue of their musical contributions to the album. Huber’s strengths clearly shine through in The Long Goodnight, which listeners will have a hard time separating from Dolly Parton’s (or Whitney Houston’s, depending on which school of musical thought you subscribe to) I Will Always Love You, and wouldn’t be out of place in a Twin Peaks episode. It is beautiful and haunting, and a highlight of the album.

If you love the softer side of the Stones, the guitar-driven oomph of evermore and the ballad-driven solemness often associated with Coldplay or Snow Patrol, then you’ll enjoy this. If you’re looking for the A Perfect Circle meets Panic at the Disco-does-metal grunt of Dead Letter Circus, you’ve definitely picked up the wrong album. You might not be disappointed, but the name is definitely where the similarities end. And that is definitely not a bad thing. - thedwarf.com.au

As music reviewers, we often find ourselves drawn towards cliché, the tried and proven phrases we’ve used for album after album, the empty levity of musical comparison.
“Shall it be Dylan, Radiohead or Buckley today?” we muse to ourselves.
Luckily for us, we are not reviewed for our reviews nor criticised for our critique. The same cannot be said for those who we subject to our opinionated correspondence. No, they must avoid cliché so that we don’t pull them up on it.

Dead Letter Chorus’ debut album avoids cliché through their clever appropriation of musical antiquity. To speak of The August Magnificent without mentioning the sheer beauty of its folk nostalgia would be a shame given an album of this standard. It drives us out to Magnolia Farm and then leaves us on the porch, with a shovel and broken bucket, to find our way home in the rain. The album shines in the cracks between table manners and historical debris, with a song writing style which is quaint and honest. Gabrielle, the sweet femme fatale of this film noir fairytale, draws us in with her sweet and worn melodic lines while Cameron Potts tugs us down from the clouds to gaze forever at the bare paths we’ve worn in the sand.

I watched you walk into the bar that night.
I knew exactly where you were going,
where everyone seemed to be going,
without me.
(The Long Goodnight)

As the opening lines of “The Long Goodnight” lilt over a subtle waltz, we begin to wonder, is the true August Magnificent life or love? Or perhaps both?

Many of the songs lean towards the feeling that we are intruding on personal correspondence between two war torn lovers, an intrusion which clashes with the very honest nature of the song. When I first heard “Misery’s Widow”, I made a note to let Gabrielle know during the interview how much I loved the song, and how much I would hate for it to be about me. On the other hand, my favourite track on The August Magnificent, “11th Dream About Aeroplanes” I would take as my lover’s ode any day, the ethereal concoction of fragmentary images makes for a lover’s dream which is disconcerting but comforting. It extrapolates on an idea not dissimilar to Milan Kundera’s Identity, the feeling that love is strong enough to make you fear the very thought of losing it.

I looked to the sky, and I outlined the moon,
It was a soundwave and it was breakin’ in two
Well I felt the end and it was comin’ soon, my love.
(11th Dream about Aeroplanes)

I wish I could take you to coffee and explain to you with wild gesticulations just why this album is a breath of fresh air, but you are just a reader. You don’t want my sporadic outbursts. You are a reader, a dear reader, but only that.

I’ll be at Magnolia Farm, I hope you’ll join me. - Trespass Magazine

"...the moody swelling of The August Magnificent takes their versatility forward by a giant leap...when Cameron Potts, Gabrielle Huber and their Dead Letter Chorus counterparts stretch for the sophisticated pop shelf they are successful... ambitious, constantly surprising...unexpectedly gorgeous...”
Simon Topper
- Rave Magazine

INDIE ALBUM OF THE WEEK

Dead Letter Chorus
Listen Carefully (we shall say this only once)
CodeOne/MGM

Like Cuthbert and the Night Walkers and The Seabellies before them, Dead letter Chorus are continuing NSW’s fine trend of bands that have too many members to fit on the Hopetoun stage.

Dead Letter Chorus (not to be mistaken with the similarly-named Dead Letter Circus) have six core members, and can sprout an extra two when needed, who are armed with a clarinet and flute. So it’s not unreasonable to expect from these young Sydneysiders a lush, rich sound; a dreamy soundscape with wistful melodies.

One of the charming aspects of Dead letter Chorus’ six-track debut slab is the interchanging male/female vocals of Gabrielle Huber and Cameron Potts, which add variety to their country-inflected indie tunes. They even work beautifully together on ‘Drifting Along’, an introspective slow-burner which builds into an epic finale. The sounds of 70’s folk and early 90’s indie rock swim through their songs, creating subdued, heart-warming music.

The EP ambles through its 25 minutes, never seeming to be in a rush, but rather strolling to enjoy the view. Some listeners may find the pace of their songs unnervingly slow, but armed with brushes, acoustic guitars and a myriad of instruments such as piano, glockenspiel and banjo, Dead Letter Chorus offer a charming and beautiful debut EP.

Rejoice, for the bearers of melody carry the torch onward.

Dom Alessio
- Brag Magazine