Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

If we cannot see the wood for the trees, then how may we be able to see The Room In The Wood, how may we feel at the thought that there is no place to step into that isn’t natural, that all around is the synthetic and the over polished, no gnarls, no knots, no rings in the tree which indicate growth, no notches on the bedpost which suggest evolution and gained knowledge.

It is the experience of what went before that makes us grow, from learning a lesson, to perhaps getting lost with the forest when we have been instructed to stick to the path; the lesson only learned by disobeying and ignoring what is expected, and the riches that come forth by enjoying the temptation.

Liverpool-based band The Room In The Wood have gone through the wood, made a root and branch study of what went before and come out into the sunlight, away from the darkened skies of the inner most workings of the mind and allowed reconciliation, a friendship to once more flourish, the room an open and sublime space in to which this self-titled debut album has been created.

Working together for the first time since their post-punk group The Room split in 1985, Paul Cavanagh and Dave Jackson have joined forces with drummer Colin George Lamont and taken on the mantle of song writing and playing music in such a way that it almost seemed inevitable that there would be a new way through the woods found, a path not seen because the undergrowth that was strewn and folded into the environment, one that when stripped back produced an effect that made the resulting scenery charismatic.

This new material is full of wealth, one that was born out of the prolific and the need arguably for another turn around the sun, dismantling any past trees of trepidation that may have blocked the way and now provide a safe- haven for the room to be visited, one where the peace pipe that was once smoked has now allowed the smoke to take shape and come up with 11 tracks that are tangible and powerful.

In songs such as Magical Thinking, False Friend, Grey Wolf Lullaby, Sky Pool, Vermillion Sands and Time Machine, and with fantastic contributions from Jake Woodward, Andy Wilson, Alistair Ligertwood, Natalie James and Mary McCombs, The Room In The Wood is an album that pulses with the fascinating prospect of what happens when you stumble once again on the belief you once carried deep in your heart, a hypnotic gesture perhaps but one that you know to be right.

Ian D. Hall