SHERWOOD PINES

A1 - Tracing Paper A2 - HDMI Love You A3 - That's All You Can Think B1 - I Nearly Married A Human B2  Fridgewords B3 - Goodbye Donkey Jacket To a degree, all musicians are a product of their environment, the places they record and the venues they play. For proof, check out the alumni of the n-wave era CBGBs venue in New York, Cabaret Voltaire™s Western Works studio in Sheffield or more recently London™s Total Refreshment Centre. We can now add to that list the Constellations Workshop in Colwick, Nottingham, a project that provides employment through making studio furniture, for out-of-work musicians. It was here, after-hours, that the music on Brown Fang™s impressive and ear-catching debut album took shape. Both members of Brown Fang, bassist John Thompson and guitarist Henry Scott AKA Henry Claude, have a long association with the Constellations Workshop. Though their musical projects are manifold  Thompson having toured with the likes of The Nectarine No9 and The Selecter, with Scott being both a mainstay of Nottingham jazz circuit and recording ambient music as Fang Jr  the work provided by the community-minded project has kept their heads above water and allowed them a space to record in when the shutters go down and the bandsaws get switched off. Yet the music showcased on Sherwood Pines is more morning-fresh and sun-kissed than industrial and sawdust-sprinkled. Combining the pair™s brilliant musicianship  think languid bass guitars and Pat Martino-esque jazz guitar licks  with saucer-eyed electronics, occasional downtempo drum machine rhythms and plenty of glistening special effects, the set™s eight tracks are as blissful and becalmed as an early morning saunter through Sherwood Forest on a misty autumn morning. For proof, check epic opener ˜Tracing Paper™, a slow-build ambient soundscape in which bubbly electronic lead lines and colourful chords sashay around Scott™s sparkling, laidback guitars, and the beguiling ˜That™s All You Can Think™, a subtle tribute to Steve Reich masterpiece ˜Electric Counterpoint™ in which slow-burn, stretched out synthesizer sounds wave in and out of a gradually evolving cycle of delay-laden electric guitar motifs. The band™s love of classic American minimalism  as well as a shared love of the Duratti Column and Robert Fripp  comes to the fore on ˜HDMI I Love You™, which boasts a deliciously dubby bassline, Tangerine Dream style synths and the deepest of ambient chords, while ˜I Nearly Married a Human™ and ˜Fridgewords™ balance bespoke electronics  languid, dewy eyed and comforting  with Scott™s gorgeously laidback, slow-release guitars. Every great album needs a triumphant conclusion, and Sherwood Pines is no different. You can hear everything that makes Brown Fang great on ˜Goodbye Donkey Jacket™, from the pin sharp, effects laden jazziness of Scott™s guitars and the fluid dexterity of Thompson™s bass, to the pleasingly spacey pulse of the synths and the gentle rhythms of the soft-focus machine drums. It™s a confident, ear-catching conclusion to a debut album that™s been years in the making.