The Quicksand Band

This is I think the fourth Dublin band I have featured on the blog and the second who's recent work has been produced by Gavin Glass. The Quicksand Band are a collective from Dublin. The band formed in 2008 originally from a recording session that was intended for singer Justin Corr. But as so often happens he ended up forming a band with Phil Clarke (also singing) Eoin Melinn on bass and Shay Cosgrave on drums. Since they started up, the band has been busy releasing two e.p's, a live radio session and most recently their début album "Approaching Rain" (all available on Bandcamp).

I'm sure the lads won’t mind me saying that they are a seasoned band. I mean this in a good way. The music sounds mature, crafted, thought-out. These aren’t fellas who turn everything up to 11 and just play. The new album has that feel about it. Twelve well crafted, structured songs that fit together both musically and thematically. Too often bands might be tempted to throw everything on an album that they have done but that doesn’t feel the case here. This is what makes a album rather than a collection of songs located on one place.

EDIT: I just realised I can post bandcamp songs on this (yes I'm that quick!) so I have added a few of the songs I was talking about at the bottom of the post.

Picking out songs to highlight this isn't easy. I love the first half of the album. Songs like "Beaming Out" and "Stars Appear" have a great southern rock lazy blues feel about them. Then on the other end of the spectrum tracks like"Open Road", "Fade Away" and "That Voice" are soft slices of americana. My current favourite is "Bury my Bones". If you're watching Hell on Wheels on TV at the moment, you might agree that this song should have been the title music. You would think it was a traditional American song. But the band captures that melancholy homesickness so well here. To give you one track to listen to without leaving this page!, "My own state of mind" is below which is from the band's second e.p Ten Gallon Drought Part 2.

The song "Distance between Us" is a b-side to the first single off the album "Homesong" and I actually prefer it to the a-side. As I said before, the higher the BMP in songs, the happier I am so that may have something to do with it. The song could almost be labelled straight-up country. Simple guitar hook, sombre steel guitar and a great baseline. If like me you noticed the whiteboard at 3:45 in, you might think, like me that the board and the band was referencing this. At least I hope so.

If you have a spare 22 minutes, you can watch the making of, of the album in two parts here and here. Facebook seems handiest for updates and funnily enough their next gig is at the No Place Like Dome festival which I recently featured on the blog. All things move in circles.