Leonardo’s Bride
Flinders Uni Refectory
Reviewed by Murray Bramwell
It’s not very often we hear a debut album as good as Angel Blood, released earlier this year by Sydney band, Leonardo’s Bride. There is a lyrical introspection and a perky confidence about them that is reminiscent of Do Re Mi or even the Go-Betweens. There is also a sense of a group arriving on the scene, not with the usual larval potential but already formed. You know… butterfly-ready.
With both the album and the single, Even When I’m Sleeping, in the Adelaide charts, the band returns for the first time since their support performances for Everything But the Girl, back in March. And even in the draughty expanse of the Flinders Uni refec, Leonardo’s Bride create their own little mise-en-scene. Designer Christo has taken their cover art signatures- red and gold circus stars on a pumpkin coloured backcloth, and festoons of fabric bunting, studded with red fairy lights. Like everything about the band it is considered, and stylish.
The band takes up positions- all seated on stools, like a chamber ensemble. Drummer Jon Howell gets installed first, then bassist Patrick Hyndes. They get a beat going and are joined by Dean Manning, songwriter, guitarist and mensch behind the Angel Blood concept. Then, finally, also in black with orange accents, Abby Dobson, youthful diva, the Voice of the Bride.
A swig of Mount Franklin, a toss of her preppie blonde locks- daggied up slightly with a carefully careless tie-up sprouting at a raffish angle- and Dobson burrows straight into Hey Hey. Howell’s beat is strong, the bass lines ripple, Manning’s guitar has a rheumy vibrato, that George-on-the-White Album sound so prevalent again these days. But it is Dobson’s voice which galvanises the sound. It could be early sixties pop. A Sad Movies Always Make Me Cry, little-girl croon. But then it stretches out, gathering in intensity, defining the emotions with pungent emphasis. “You don’t have to go for that. ” The repetitions gather, the band plays sweetly and loud in a strong, clear mix. Dobson trills fearlessly above, gliding in thermals, dipping and turning in Manning’s fetching melody.
A new song follows, Oh Yeah , is it ? And from the album, Kissing Bedrock. “You’ve been kissing bedrock I can tell.” A slow ballad, with hints of Deb Conway. But, again, Dobson’s vocal creates shivers. Just when you expect her to taper off she finds angel gear. Forty One False Starts has the Leonardos waxing literary – Hemingway and Lenny Bruce. As in The Problematic Art of Conversation-“it makes me think of Oscar Wilde…” – Manning can be awfully arch, but he knows how to wrap a lyric in a pretty tune.
Which brings them to Even When I’m Sleeping, a strong reading of their hit single, lit with a single white light and a plangent acoustic guitar from Dobson – while a crowd of young things sways to the newest minting of pop romanticism. Fall is another highpoint, Dobson’s own composition and one of the album’s best. A simple hook- “Don’t fall for me, I’m already down” – spirals down into minor chords and plaintive rhythms, chiming guitars and throaty vocals. More hints of the White Album as the band loops over and through in hypnotic repetition, but it is hard to resist alright already.
A bunch near me keeps calling for Buzz but instead we get Buddha Baby, the new single, complete with three part harmonies, then Titanic and, to close the set, a big chunky version of So Brand New. It has been a classy set, with great sound from the air traffic controllers and a well-judged set list from the sit down band.
For encores there is the enticement of Stay. “Stay another change of heart, stay another memory, stay another great expectation.” Not much on the page, perhaps, but perfect pop in the hands of the Bride. Then Manning cranks up the voltage, hits the pedal, and Abby Dobson takes another deep breath. “Hey Buzz, this town doesn’t hold me any more.” Never mind that Buzz is Christo’s rabbit. Never mind the incipient banality of suburban pop. Just listen to that bridge, that tender tough guitar, that heartbreak vocal. The lineage is from Goffin and King, from the Bobbys, Vinton and Vee, from California folk rock and Liverpool lullabies. It is the history of the heart at 45 rpm – and all part of the dowry for Leonardo’s Bride. They are a great little band and deserve the good buzz they are getting because, even what we’ve heard before, sounds… so brand new.
The Adelaide Review, September, 1997.