Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

In some eyes, even a simple x at the bottom of a letter can display more than the writer may have intended, the imagination of the covert and furtive looking for the signs and symbols of a life lived to excess, of the additional effort placed in clandestine response to a love undeclared.

X’s, the soft and passionate underscore, or the surplus demand of a mind that understands that we breathe daily but we require to fully engage with a life always on the edge of extinction. Such is the pleasure between the two states of existence that it is hardly surprising, but nevertheless pleasant and crucially enjoyed, that the Texas formed band Cigarettes After Sex serenade the listener with a set of songs that are fruitfully engaging, and positively appreciated.

Through tracks on the new album such as Silver Sable, Dark Vacay, Hot, Dreams From Bunker Hill, and Baby Blue Movie, as well as the lead single from the album, Tejano Blue, the true sense of the Indie workmanship shines with a gleaming passion, a state of adored accomplishment to be revel in, but also reflect deeply as the course of the world turns forever tantalisingly out of synch with our wishes and commands.

Once more the alluring spacious and serene voice of Greg Gonzalez brings the semblance of intense lullaby to the forefront of the listener’s conscious; the apt reminder that the deeply personal requires not an opinion, but a expression of influence if it is to heard with truth and soul; with a joy, with pain at what was lost, and the subtle declaration of change intended…whether with a kiss at the bottom, or life built with excess in mind, what must be remembered is that in the end it is how we explore it in emotional belief that matters.

An album of sensitive understanding, a dreamlike fascination played out in the normalcy of human interaction; Cigarettes After Sex new release is a playbook for the insightful.

Cigarettes After Sex’s X’s is out now and available from Partisan Records. 

Ian D. Hall