Dismantle My Mantle

They have been compared to Auckland band Charlie Ash, but really the two bands are incredibly different. Chairlift employs a creative, Kate Bush-like kooky vocal style, at times harsh and grating, other times breathy and cooing. I’ve been meaning to write about Chairlift for ages, their wonderful escapist melodies in their song Evident Utensil cause me to lapse into day dream at the most inconvenient time, but inconvenient dreams are often the most fun. Their beautiful song Bruises has since featured on an iPod nano ad and has seen the once little-known band quickly catapulted to fame. Bruises is a lovely, sweet, delicate little ditty about a girl trying to impress a guy – “I tried to do handstands for you/ but every time I fell for you/ I’m constantly black and blue/ for you”. Swathed in an airy aura of synths and clinking bells it’s an incredibly romantic and endearing song. Evident Utensil is also supremely brilliant, I love the fruity backing vocals growling in the background that sound like a cheesy ’90s ad or a Billy Idol backing singer, and the krunky synths and guitar chords that gracefully grate in the bridge. Chairlift’s sound is considerably unique despite the references, they are utterly new and fresh, and there’s little wonder in this considering they originate out of the epicentre of modern music, Brooklyn, NYC.

The band was caught in a video-battle recently when they beat Kanye West to the punch in releasing a music video that utilised pixel-morphing technology. Evidently Kanye was planning on releasing his video for Welcome To Heartbreak much later, but when he learned of Chairlift’s video he released his video with the same psychedelic effect straight away. Allegedly, the pixel-morphing technology exhibited in both videos was invented by the people who made Chairlift’s video. Needless to say Chairlift did it first, but Kanye’s firm hold on the world saw him gain more widespread recognition than his indie counterparts. Nevertheless the video for Evident Utensil displays considerably more creativity than Kanye’s video – Chairlift’s video features swimmers, who burst out of one scene and into the next, synchronised to the sound of guitar strums. Not to mention Chairlift’s song is a lot more interesting and captivating than the monotonous and repetitive Welcome To Heartbreak. The bleeding rainbows and wind-swept colours in the pixel-morphing illustrate the magnificent distortion vs clarity and confounding expressive nature of the band and their song. Chairlift is a wonderfully creative group who has the kind of enviable carefree artistic nature one only spots in a real auteur who lives and breathes his art, not simply brags about it. The three-piece is going on a USA/Canada tour with Peter Bjorn and John after a short stint of shows with Sebastien Tellier on the United States West Coast.