Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

All over the Baltic Quarter in Liverpool, bands and artists had been thrilling audiences during the second day of the Threshold Festival but there can’t have been many more that were as highly anticipated, nor as keenly appreciated as Science of the Lamps. The near impossible task of getting perhaps one of the largest gatherings of musicians and singers on a stage anywhere in Liverpool over the weekend, including the ever superb musician Luke Moore on cello and keyboards and the wonderful vocal talent of Mersey Wylie alongside the woman of the weekend Kaya Herstad Carney.

Kaya not only proved why her music is so much loved and enjoyed but as part of the Threshold team, her work has been cut out for months and yet with a huge measure of dignity and the wicked glint in her eye, she and the remainder of this highly rated bunch of musicians took to the stage at The Picket and gave a performance and a half, a musical moment that was just inspired and full of devilish intrigue and songs that would not be out of place in a Nordic fairy-tale.

Kicking of the set with Superhero Me and with the images of American Comic powerhouse D.C.’s Wonder Woman being shown above the heads of those on stage the evening was going to be anything but staid. Kaya and Science of the Lamps never could be accused of gravitating towards the beige or the uninteresting, as they proved with the beautiful and jolting Fight For Him, a song that tackles the prickly subject of child custody, not an easy topic to broach but a haunting sound that touched everyone in the building.

The band performed the excellent 27 Club and there was a certain sorrow that was etched upon those that got the significance of the song and the images of those musicians who sadly lost their life before even reaching 30. The evening took a weirdly wonderfully turn as Kaya introduced the only cover of the evening, the Britney Spears song Toxic. Whereas arguably Ms. Spears version panders to a genre of music that lost its way, the way Science of the Lamps take it apart, bring it down several notches and then give it this wonderful creepy edge which is tinged with notions of female sexuality makes it an absolute must to hear.

A great evening of music by Kaya Herstad Carney and the wealth of ability on stage was bought to a fine end by the sublime and unbelievably brilliant Duckling Hell. Truly inspiring!

Ian D. Hall