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Aug 30, 2012 Web Exclusive By Sam Cleeve

There’s a unique eeriness about Piano Magic’s 11th LP, Life Has Not Finished With Me Yet. Opening with a drone-based sketch that has origins both Medieval and Far Eastern, the collective’s sense of innovation is apparent from the very beginning. Furthermore, this exotic, ethnomusical thread runs right throughout the record—the haunting interludes of a Spanish guitar on “The Slightest of Threads,” for example, could be lifted from the most evocative of soundtracks (were it not for the sparse and unnervingly steadfast beat in the background, and the brief, noisy collapse of the song). Meanwhile, the quivering Halloween synths that introduce following track “Sing Something” do nothing to help the situation: “I’ve missed the last train/It did not wait,” sings the lone, fearful female voice.

Life Has Not Finished With Me Yet is a collection of almost unclassifiable cross-genre electro-acoustic experiments; an evocative soundtrack to a harrowing flashback you only ever imagined. While consequently some tracks here may suit tastes where others don’t, this record’s unrelenting originality can always be relied upon. (www.piano-magic.co.uk)

Author rating: 7/10