4 / 5 – Entrancing debut from Mancunian upstarts
Disregard that title – there’s nothing ‘incidental’ about this impressive debut album from W.H. Lung. Since they first emerged in 2017, the Manchester trio – whose name is taken from a local Chinese supermarket – have been defined by their unwavering sense of purpose. Everything from their intense, atmospheric live shows to their enigmatic, elusive image, W.H. Lung are a band with a clear, meticulous plan of attack.
That much is evident on the band’s keenly-awaited debut album, Incidental Music, a collection of songs rich in depth, detail and nuance. Indeed, first time listeners might even be a tad overwhelmed by W.H. Lung’s soaring, over-arching ambition – just take the opening track, ‘Simpatico People’, a ten-minute psychedelic odyssey powered by motorik rhythms, pulsing synths and chiming guitar lines.
The trio’s real genius, however, is how they combine that voracious appetite for genres – everything from krautrock and post-punk to synth-pop and avant-garde – with fluid, bracing musicianship and a real capacity for melody. ‘Inspiration!’ sounds like the lovechild of Talking Heads and Hookworms; ‘An Empty Room’ highlights the band’s tremendous talent, a la Mogwai, for atmosphere and tempo; while ‘Second Death Of My Face’ is a perfect blend of sonic idiosyncrasy and pop insistency.
The end result is an album which demands you put on your headphones, crank up the volume and simply immerse yourself in its vast universe of glorious noise.
