Victories At Sea – In Memory Of

Victories At Sea have been bewitching live audiences for a while now, but a proper release of any of their music’s been frustratingly absent. Happily that’s all been rectified with In Memory Of, a 4 track debut EP on the uber cool Static Caravan label. Opening with Stay Positive, which manages the neat trick of being atmospheric enough to enjoy lying in a lonely bedsit but sufficiently groovy to dance to (in an eighties stylee), it has pleasing hints of prime era OMD and Killing Joke in there, coupled with the kind of anthemic guitar sounds that Big Country practically trademarked back in the day. Next up Dive sounds like the kind of track that PEACE would SSWEAT BBLOOD AND TTEARS over, whilst No Escape’s dreamily sparse outlines gradually get filled in with lush thickly layered guitar. Glorious. Truly there is no escape. Serial killer’s lament? Musical suicide note? Break up anthem? Whatever the story behind Low it’s a suitably epic end to the EP. “Now the sky is falling” laments VAS’s lead singer JP hauntingly as an ominous wave of sound descends then echoes away to nothingness. An EP that’s well worth remembering...

In Memory Of is available right now via Piccadilly Records