Feathercut Reviews

As In The Nursery, twins Nigel and Klive Humberstone scored points last year for their achingly grandiose remix of `Haunted Dancehall'. This time around they've borrowed Barry Adamson's concept of creating a soundtrack for a film which doesn't exist. `Feathercut' is an album full of moments which, for a change, deserve to be described as `epic', charged with dreamy melodics and sweeping beauty. Like the title track itself, which slow-dives from sci-fi ambience to skyscraper-tall grandeur over a languid, dub groove. Or the bitter-sweet atmospherics of `Empty Drama' which ebbs and flows like the tide. The effect sounds pretty much as if Dimitri Tiompkin had discovered acid house (though they'd prehaps prefer a tripping Ennio Morricone) - huge, carthartic string crescendos over pulsing basslines and breathlessly pretty synth patterns. Closer points of reference swing from Nightmares On Wax to Orbital, but then Les Jumeaux (get out the French/English dictionary...) add in something all of their own. There's a strong sense that the pair share more than a passing interest in the soundtrack as a source of emotional shorthand. And that's a concept which sweeps through much of Detroit's best techno, from Jeff Mills to Carl Craig and beyond. But it ain't dance music - that's for sure. Unless you count dancing with your heartstrings. Dynamic, gorgeous and emotive. Ambient with attitude. Definitely one from the heart.

Steven Ash
Generator

OK, get Brian Eno and Barry Adamson on the blower - looks like we've got ourselves a pair of slags come down our manor bold as you like, guv. Spooko Sheffield twin combo In The Nursery (i.e. Nigel & Klive Humberstone) just happen to be flogging their latest Franco-monickered art project as &quit;a soundtrack with no film". But, rather than Bazzer's easy-noir psychosis or the tundra-thatched ones minimal space echoes, Les Jumeaux (French for `twins' surprisingly) pen corporate aromatherapy muzak for yer difficult "candlelit dinner for two" market. Hence a couple of "Tonight. Matthew, we are Tricky" creak-scapes (`Carroussella', `Miracle Road'), the sound of Orbital hitting cash machines with a shopping trolly (`Cyflo') and a veritable glut of Vangelis lift-noodles bearing little relation to their ITN/Weatherall collaborations. Never mind. One night down a dark Sheffield alley, the Humberstones should get their comeuppance from a shiny-pated gentleman and dapper companion. No Jury would convict them.

Andrew Male
Select Magazine

`Les Jumeaux' a.k.a. Klive and Nigel Humberstone are more commonly recognised as `In The Nursery' and were responsible for turning Weatherall's John Carpenter-esque `Haunted Dancehall' from a scary tune to an even scarier tune, with an orchestral reconstruction on the Sabres `Versus' mini-LP. Needless to say that this opus is a dark and orchestral-based collection with ventures from hardtrance to Trip-Hop with influences from the `Sabres of Paradise' evident amongst the various styles contained here. Track one `Feathercut' has a Brian Transeau feel to it in its orchestra/house mood. `Carroussella' begins with whispering over a `Sabres'-like backbeat and an eerie vocal in the Portishead/Tricky genre. `Empty Drama' begins with a cosmicbaby approach in the synths Olivier Web uses in `Spicelab' with is very smart. `Compliance' has a Sabre-esque cyber opening with more electronics in the mix than the previous but sustains the orchestral tone an comparisons with the `Sabres' own `Inter-Legen-Ten-Ko' track. This gives an atmospheric sense of drifting over a fierce changing drum pattern. `Cyflo' again has scary trance synths drifting over a classical piano and a slow beat with electro bursts and bleeps. Track six, `Miracle Road', is the tune Sven Vath should have made! Not dissimilar to his own `L'esperanca', this is a gorgeous offering with a slow beat and return of Dee de Rocha's vocal textures, like Tony Halliday, but more sublime. `Late Poem' is a hauntingly dark electro induced track over a painful bassline. `Japanese Secret' has cool keyboard hooks with Japanese voice samples. The sound FX remind me of the cartoon `Fantom Cat' (seriously!), the eerie strings and classical instrumentation over the piano. Morbid it is, but with an ironicaly lifting tone. The final track `Big Spark' detracts from the whole feel of `Feathercut' with heavy duty chemical beats contained within an immense sonic assault across one and a half minutes! All in all, this is a strange collection of modern clasical pieces for the purists with a hint of trance for the Technoheads, and a range of heavy beats and anxious vox for the Headz. Give it a listen, you know you want to!

Fusion

Sheffield duo Klive & Nigel Humerstone weave lilting electro-acoustic harmonies that exhibit greater song structures than the aimless ambient noodlings of their contemporaries. Worth your pennes any day of the week.
Sheffield twins Nigel and Klive Humberstone, a.k.a. the Sabres associated In The Nursery - have produced, to use an old chestnut, a soundtrack without a film. Digital epics, string soaked and dubbed out with the haunting vocals of Dee De Rocha adding to the cinematics. For those moments spent cosily staring out of a window at the rain lashed folk outside.

JB
Jockey Slut

From the opening sequence of the first track you know you are listening to an impressive selection of music. Swathes of sweeping synths are overlaid with subtle melodies enhanced by superb trance-like hypnotic arrangements. Incredible soundscapes are created and the track which immediately stands out is `Japanese Secret'. Buy this album and you won't be disappointed one tiny bit.

Musical Notes TELETEXT

Les Jumeaux brew up a trippy mystic groove. A mostly moody meander through ambient electronica. Feathercut is really a soundtrack album, ideal for that low-budget, yet-to-be made kitchen-sink sci-fi drama, or a fitting accompaniment to a spot of home internet surfing.

City Life

Jam-packed with dubby keyboards, this epic sounding slow-beat effort from Sheffield has a certain panache that makes it irrisistible. Check out in particular the stylish and distinctly Tricky-esque female vocals on `Carroussella', a track to send shivers up your spine and then down again.

Epigram