Nobody makes sad synth- pop quite like British bands. Jessica Weiss’s solo project New German Cinema mine the saddest parts of alt-pop from the last forty years to the present day, and spin it into literate, desolate loveliness. It’s haunting and crepuscular, best enjoyed on trains at nighttime.
Weiss’ vocals, like Broadcast’s Trish Keenan and St Etienne ‘s Sarah Bracknell before her, are quiet and eerily airy. They’re pitch perfect but detached, slightly distrait. This reinforces the otherworldly nature of the album, and casts Weiss as a sort of unreliable narrator in these little vignettes.
Best of the tracks are ‘Being Dead’, which is the best tune Pet Shop Boys or Depeche Mode are yet to write, ambient pop ‘Swirling Pain’, the moody piano instrumentals ‘Hera’s Theme I’ and ‘II’ and the sad bangers ‘I Become Heavy’ and ‘Eyes’.
It drifts somewhat aimlessly enough, meditating on pain and ennui, but there’s much beauty to be found within, the more you listen.
Out now via Felte Records
Hit The North 