Review: Mothlite – Dark Ages
A four year break between your debut and second album is usually more than enough for the often fickle music industry to forget who you are and what you sound like. However, this is not the case when you spend this time collaborating with the likes of Ulver and Grumbling Fur. For his return under the guise of Mothlite, the delving multi-instrumentalist Daniel O’Sullivan, uses the creeping ambient flavour of a combination of Mogwai, Cocteau Twins, Adem and, to a lesser extent Four Tet.
He elects open up an explorative 2nd album, through the haunting gospel lagged, ‘Wounded Lions’. A hushed femme/male vocal drive leads into a wandering, digitally toed, ambient goth instrumental, as this epic starts to take shape. Before O’Sullivan’s poetic tones deliver a fatalistic message. An almost samba percussion drive lifts up the wandering 80s prog’ pop exposé, ‘Disappear’ whereby a lost soul is waved off.
‘The Blood’, swerves towards a more indie rock side with digital interludes providing an unpredictable Shy Child swerve. O’Sullivan delivers the reflective lyrics with an echoing ache:
“You can live alone in the silence; throw your secrets out to the ocean.”
The Gary Numan electro-pop spliced ‘The Underneath’, provides for a stirring, reflective interlude. Empirical digital intoning and weary distorted vocals give a forging 80’s feel to the mystical, ‘Dreamsinter Nightspore’. The slow-building ambient twisting, ‘Milk’ continues the reflective vibe, aided by a tinkering digital element and patting percussion. The musing twisted folk effort, ‘Red Brook’ puts the lid on an, at times, bracing second album that sees O’Sullivan exploring his roots and influences, covering the outskirts of a range of genres.
