Plastic Mermaids hail from the Isle of Wight, so inevitably since they first cropped up on a handful of blogs at the end of 2013 they’ve found writers trying to make links to their (relative) geographic isolation and the music. Certainly this band don’t sound deeply try-hard fashionable or of the zeitgeist, something which could also be said of the garden isle itself, despite it hosting two of the UK’s premier festivals every year, one of which has attracted the likes of The XX, Grimes and James Blake.
However irrespective of location and fashion what we’re convinced of is that Plastic Mermaids sound pretty inspiring. This probably sounds like pretentious bollocks but it’s the kind of music that makes us want to go out on a cold cloudless night and watch our breath float up to the stars.
The two songs we’ve heard from the band’s debut Drømtorp EP (which is released tomorrow) are silky and cinematically gorgeous. On Polaroids we love the way the weary warm vocals mix with swelling strings and keys to create something quite stirring by the end. Add to this the surreal stop motion video with Crayola rockets and weird sea scenes - one of the most inventive we’ve seen for some time - and you’ll probably (like us) be convinced that this is a band with bundles of imagination. Title track Drømtorp itself is a lesson in top-notch songcraft, never over-reaching itself, yet still attaining a crowning choir coated glory. It’s intoxicating stuff.
Douglas Richards, Jamie Richards, Chris Jones, Tom Farren and Chris Newnham are the men who form Plastic Mermaids. They play London tomorrow (sold out) but you can also find them at Sixty Million Postcard in Bournemouth in April, then Bristol’s Dot to Dot festival in May with further dates following. The EP can be ordered from here on either digital download or blue vinyl.
Plastic Mermaids - Drømtorp
Plastic Mermaids - Polaroids
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