Sun / Decrease (Reviews)

Reviews

Reviews:

Huw Costin - Something/Nothing

Mark Lanegan -

“Huw Costin makes classic records with an attention to detail not often heard anymore - achingly beautiful, direct and gentle poetry”

Mojo -

“Something/Nothing boasts a recommendation from Mark Lanegan (“achingly beautiful, direct and gentle poetry”.) The album’s opening line - “Yes, I believe we are doomed” - doubtless raised a smile too. Yet Costin only descends to Lanegan’s stygian depths on Brain Damage, it’s ominous electronic flurries and air of preternatural calm suggesting a modern day Roy Harper. Doomed is one of a handful of songs with a wavering Jeff Buckley aura. There are also bucolic reveries (one titled, weirdly, Move To The City), while Do You Really Love Me? positively skips and Butterfly Girls floats through a gorgeous 104 seconds of fluttery voice, acoustic guitar and delicate strings. If the shift between light and dark occasionally jars, it’s equally refreshing to hear such scant regard for the usual boundaries between genre and style.

The Quietus -

“the title track is a slowly-building piece of electronic-tinged pop, centred around the choral wash of vocals and pinned down by a skipping, Animal Collective-esque bass line …”

The Line of Best Fit -

“‘Something/Nothing’… serene in a quite spectacular way.”

“‘Disconnected’ is more traditional in structure and possessing a folkier slant, the track finds its USP at around the one minute mark when there’s a glorious build-up/breakdown reminiscent of latter-day Radiohead…”

Rock Feedback -

“The title track is a beautiful gauzy thing that builds without ever crescendoing…”

Simon Raymonde / Amazing Radio -

“Beautiful”

Coyote - Our Time

“…’Our Time’, a bitter sweet, melancholic canyon of a beauty is destined for classic status”.

- Another Night On Earth

Torn Sail - Birds

“What an incredible track, it’s right up there with the best of John Martyn or CSN; ‘Birds’ starts out as an achingly beautiful acoustic meander and quickly develops into a ‘soaring over canyons’ even Laurel Canyon’esque classic. ”

—Another Night On Earth

“The sound of Neu! hanging out in Laurel Canyon…Lofty music for high times.”

- Halcyon.com

“A wonderful release and if this isn’t in my end of year chart then either 2011 has been ridiculous good or I’ve truly lost my marbles.”

- Soulbuggin.com

Regrets

“It’s like the third Big Star album mixed with the Stone Roses… It’ll make you cry.”

NME (Yearbook Top 10 Songs)

“an emotive recollection of a love gone wrong”

UNCUT ****

“Beautiful, psychedelic and haunting”

EYES FOR INDIE

“‘Carrie’s Gone’ is a beautiful ballad…’Lover’ is sublime. ‘Fight The World’ is a beautiful if embittered tune that feels like the bustling city streets that a man sits on whilst screaming his heart out…’I’m Gonna Miss You’…is a stillborn lover’s lament”.

NIGHT FLIGHT

“It’s largely acoustic but broad in scope, from 60s-style folk (I’m Gonna Miss You, Time) to dark, thudding indie (Leisure & Technology). Costin’s voice recalls The Coral’s James Skelly then Ian Brown but its real appeal are the subtle, addictive melodies.”

NOTTINGHAM EVENING POST

Reviews: Full Moon At Christmas Time

“More like a Ted Hughes poem (see The Warm and The Cold) than a song by a modern day artist”

BANDIDGE.COM

“‘Full Moon…’ is a beguilingly bare flirtation with the good side of psychedelia.”

CHANNEL4.COM

“Huw Costin plies his trade in stark, sparse, acoustic melancholy… an honest, intelligent and talented songwriter.”

TASTY FANZINE