Label: Independent
Release Date: 27th May 2016
PORTS will be the next stadium band to come out of Northern Ireland.
There are at least six tracks on here that are just screaming out to be huge, anthemic, signature stadium tunes. PORTS is just standing on the sidelines waiting for the call out to that overwhelming, echoing roar.
It doesn’t take a lot of imagination to get there – just close eyes, open ears – and you’ll hear.
Perfectly crafted, beautifully produced, masterful musicianship, melodious and harmonious, tuneful and dulcet, ‘The Devil Is A Songbird’ totally deserves to take PORTS to great heights.
Stephen McCool’s vocals are faultless; a voice that could fill a stadium no bother. Perfect pitch, great name, cool blue eyes, strong jawline (I think I’ll stop now – you get the picture). If you’ve seen them live, McCool has all the charisma and easy charm you’d expect of a front man.
Simple Minds spring to mind, even Spandau Ballet, to REM, Snow Patrol, U2, and inevitably Coldplay (sorry but it’s just the way McCool hits those high notes effortlessly).
With a vibrancy reminiscent of Foals and the lyrical intelligence of Yannis Philippakis, there’s a youthful appeal yet with the wit of wise heads on young shoulders to this four-piece called PORTS (formerly Little Bear).
‘We Are Miles Away’ has harmonies that hanker for the Beach Boys, there’s the sensitive intensity of Brain Wilson but fit for a 21st-century world.
‘I’d Let You In’ is a song steeped in passion and turmoil. The sea seeps in – a theme that flows throughout this album – a sense of waves lapping shorelines, and at times, with those violins, crashing cymbals – the sense of listless seamanship, tossed on tumultuous waves, seeking any port in a storm. For more than a few moments, I think of The Waterboys. I even hear Fleet Foxes here and there.
‘In Summer’ has hints of Fleetwood Mac and ‘Albatross’, but with a passive aggressive undercurrent. Lazily, carelessly, lost at sea, it drifts along for just over six minutes, ambivalent yet achingly honest.
‘What’s On Your Mind’ sees PORTS change direction, a different tack altogether. Taking on a philosophical twist, a subtle political comment on a generation and its lost compass – more than subtly suggesting that PORTS has both substance and wit.
The title track – ‘The Devil Is A Songbird’ – brings those crashing waves back into play, but then this whistling tune unfurls, along with other surprises as the lyrical ballad unfolds. Memorable, aching and dark, ‘The Devil Is A Songbird’, exquisitely picking at the heart. Hits hard and burns.
Thirteen tracks comprise ‘The Devil Is A Songbird’. It is an enigmatic album, equal parts dark and light, yin and yang. Literate, poetic with references to Innisfree and the one and only Yeats, intelligent and bright, it is an utterly exquisite work of art.
Opening with ‘Sunrise’ and mournful, gentle harmonies, elegant piano intro, cello, crescendo – an elongated, mind-buck of a note, a siren, suddenly truncated after only a minute – and so the tone is set.
PORTS are already brilliant live. See them before they set stadia alight.
Thursday 26th May 2016 – Flowerfield Arts, Portstewart
Friday 27th May 2016 – The Black Box, Belfast
Saturday 28th May 2016 – The Glassworks, Derry
Saturday 4th June 2016 – Whelans, Dublin
Friday 15th July 2016 – Railway Tavern, Fahan