It’s been many moons now since Sean Cook left Spiritualized under a black cloud, though not before playing his part in crafting one of the finest pieces of recorded music ever committed to tape of course. Go straight to the back of the class if you know not that we refer to ‘Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space’, and when the final bell has tolled race to the nearest record stockist and acquaint yourself with it immediately. It wouldn’t take a genius to fathom that when he did move to take up the reigns himself, results would not be nearly so otherworldly or untouchable, no matter the gravity of the sizable chip on his shoulder. But what was surprising was how solid the roots of the band he went on to lead, Bristol’s retro psychedelic-rockers Lupine Howl, would be. Technically flawless for a couple of albums, all they really lacked was a heart to give a story to their songs.
Now going solo as The Flies (perhaps, as with his former mentor, the only band formation viable to him) his palette has broadened, or at least loosened, spread out, although some of the same problems of realisation remain. This mini album was originally kicking about as a promo in a much extended form over a year ago and the shape in which it arrives might be a bit too fleeting in flavour, compared to the solid breadth of that set of songs. What we have here is a set of smoke trails as songs, under deep blue light, dissipating in a sedative and hypnotic slow motion. That they don’t really solidify makes them much the opposite of his Lupine Howl days, but because he’s come all the way through the middle ground and out the other side, neither has he caught a grip on the greatness that is always just evades him.
But this is a blissful collection of contemplative textures nonetheless; toiling emotions in limbo, evolving, finding their shape in an atmospheric vacuum. ‘All Too Human’ opens the record like a Death In Vegas treatment of a track from The Verve’s ‘A Northern Soul’ – eastern, electronic, psychedelic, persuasive but yet never quite oppressive. ‘Lord Of The Flies’ continues that theme but with heightened weightlessness, and ‘In This World’ and ‘One Less Heart Beats’ tip-toe around in the dark, more organic, acoustic, lit by moonlight, but still as thoughtful, lonely. The centrepiece of the album though is a genuinely creative reinterpretation of the Stones’ ‘Ruby Tuesday’, as though covered by Jeff Buckley caught in a paperweight, plenty of fairy dust and precious few pockets of air. It’s fairly bloody beautiful. The looming spectre of his former band will never leave him as long as he stays so close stylistically, see especially ‘Harmonica’, but there’s evidence here to suggest he could shelter from it at least. If only he’d take a few really bold steps.