It Hugs Back – Inside Your Guitar [Album]

4AD

April 6, 2009, 09:24 AM

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I saw It Hugs Back on stage at End of the Road festival in 2007 and made a mental note to look out for more of their chugging guitars-and-organ indie-rock. So when I first started listening to debut album ‘Inside Your Guitar’ I thought either my memory was failing or I had got the wrong band. And then I realised It Hugs Back had signed to 4AD and things started to make more sense. Opening track ‘Q’ starts off as they mean to go on: warm, dreamy guitars, barely audible vocals, all played at a snail’s pace with drums low in mix. It brings together the gentler side of Yo La Tengo and Dean Wareham's Luna with a mellow take on shoegaze.

The next two tracks ‘Work Day’ and ‘Don't Know’ show the band at their most animated - gorgeous summery pop shuffles both, the first singing about thinking of the better things in life whilst stuck at work, and the second ... well I can't actually work out the words to Matthew Simms's mumbled vocals but it is lovely, with delightful fuzzy organ breaks and finishing with the closest It Hugs Back get to wig-out. Next is ‘Forgotten Song’ which slows things down again and feels like waking up bathed in sunshine, a slow sparse drift of a song with occasional swelled harmonies. And so the record goes on never deviating from this warm, wistful palette – if you’ve made it this far you’ll stick with it. It Hugs Back might be too soft-spoken for some tastes or to stamp out an instant identity for themselves but ‘Inside Your Guitar’ is a gem, a beguilingly beautiful collection that creeps into your brain by degrees.

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