Yoav: 'Charmed And Strange'

Israeli born Yoav might have more accurately called his album 'Charming And Strange', because it manages to be both in turn, a record that takes some of the themes and sounds of grime and dub and uses them in an acoustic blend of paranoia and subtle violence. The guitar here is used in as innovative and novel a way as any electronic or hip hop act, and the atmosphere is genuinely tense; the songs frequently superb.

Opener 'Adore Adore' leaks tension and suspicion, with softly menacing vocals barely rising above the slick flicks of guitar, which flit about with much virtuosity. 'Club Thing' has the sparsest of beats, and much of what percussion there is comes from hints of the guitar being pinged and scraped. A slightly sleazy R n’ B singer is emulated in a haunting choral section, where we see some of Yoav’s intuitive feel for the music of the nightlife underworld at its finest. Where others lay on extravagant electronic flourishes, he emulates these with high pitched plucking that dances over the tune.

'Live' has a hint of the oriental, with the guitar coming out over a high tempo rhythm and a sliding eastern sample. Halfway through it settles itself into a well anticipated slow middle section, which mixes melancholy with near psychotic intensity. This is followed by the rich 'One By One', which plumbs technical supremacy and subtle but solid songwriting talent. The result is slow series of carefully offset moments that keeps bringing the tune back to a central recurrence. 'There Is Nobody' is a rambunctious blues rumble that works itself periodically back into the empty scared territory and then back to its enjoyable riff.

If the intensity and slightly over earnest quality in some of this begins to grate, then it is during the second half of the record, where the relatively bland lyrical fodder starts to make itself more prominent and we hear less of the technical acrobatics. A brilliantly nauseous cover of the Pixies’ standard 'Where Is My Mind' rounds off the album, Yoav stretches familiar timings and the world/grime slant on his playing also acts as a nod to M.I.A’s recent album 'Kala', where the rapper included sections from the lyric on one of her own tracks. At the moment Yoav is touring low key venues around the country and this suggests he is not to be missed.

Released on 17th March 2008 by Island.

Written by Huw Green.