Munich Rec. Birds That Change Colour : On Recording the Sun and Moon (B,2011)***'
A few years after the band’s demo, finally here’s the official, well-produced album. Birds That Change Colours have strong roots and interest in the sixties, especially through the idea that the kind of psych-pop songs from those days had a foundation with acoustic guitars, from there were expanded with a good production and additional arrangements like with more guitars, including amplified, electric and also fuzz guitars, an additional note on keyboards, and of course, not to forget certain overdubs on the lead voice or close-harmony vocal arrangements. This means also, mostly slowly cradling rhythms, moody and vague atmospheres in the head reminiscent of those days, even though they’re gone, romanticised in a dream-like fantasy. “Tales from the Moon” has some T-Rex, Syd Barrett, even Donovan, and also “Sunny Sides Of Me” wouldn’t be like it is without having listened to Syd Barrett, like the odd descending singing in the tune, the harmonies in the slide guitar and such, it is a positive song. “Woods” has an orchestration added, proving how such 60s-inspired songs still sound better with such a completion of arrangements. But there are escapist more American sounding landscapes too, like in “Lullaby”, a western desert mood song with amplified guitar and harmonium. “Never Ending first of May” has a bluesier emotion to start with. This last track evolves to some psychedelic excursion, ending with a hurdy gurdy drone dominant note in the end.
The band invited lots of musicians to participate, like Zita Swoon-bassist Christophe Albertijn, Evil Superstars’ drummer Dave Schroyen, Piet Stryckers for the hurdy gurdy and string arrangements, Patrick Denecker on flutes, Micky Peeters on keyboards, Lais’ Nathalie Delcroix on second voice, Pascal Dewez on guitar, Luc Warniers on harmonium and Jo Zanders on percussion.
