Album Review: Fearing – Shadow

Fearing have released their debut album “Shadow” via the coldwave imprint Funeral Party Records, the band’s first full length promises a hybrid borne of Coldwave, Post Punk, Shoegaze and to my ears, good old fashioned old school UK goth. The ‘Intro‘ heightens you expectations, eerie waves of treble laced echoing guitar swiftly build and bleed into the brooding atmospheric opener ‘Shadow‘. This is a moody introspective album, the atmospheric echoing and phasing guitar lines are a perfect late night soundtrack, one that feels like it has been painstakingly created and constructed, sometimes feeling a little too precise and surgical. As counterpoints to the sombre tone there are the more driven moments, these maintain the dark atmosphere but bring some adrenaline into the mix, the likes of ‘Sherbert‘ and ‘Good Talks‘ stop ‘Shadow‘ slipping into melancholia, something the best bands that influenced their sound always managed to avoid on their finest long players.

Those influences do manifest themselves throughout ‘Shadow‘, if you aren’t picking up Interpol and The Chameleons along with a smattering of the earlier recordings by the likes of The Sisters Of Mercy, The Mission, The Fields Of Nephilim and Joy Division / New Order then I’d ask whether we’re listening to the same album, The Chameleons influence is particularly prevalent in the album’s slower tracks, ‘Pictured Perfect‘, ‘Glow‘ and ‘Still Working Hard‘ carry all the trademarks of that criminally overlooked Manchester post punk band. Whilst this is a stunningly well executed album, and one that will be a guaranteed floor filler for the goth two step, there is something over familiar about “Shadow“. It could be organic and I’m completely wrong, but “Shadow” feels like elements of the other bands that came before them, all of which have been surgically transplanted to create something that lives. We all know from the famous writings of Mary Shelley that these things can go wrong, but in this case the outcome is a surprisingly happy ending.

“Shadow” can be streamed and purchased on vinyl and digital formats via Bandcamp here