The beautifully atmospheric, warm, and rich Strange Game, Conflict Choir’s debut album is a wholly engrossing listen from start to finish. Populated by superbly melodic and engaging songs, masterfully balanced mixes, and terrific performances, Conflict Choir are debuting with an absolutely blissful listen.
Conflict Choir are a band based in Birmingham, England. With a sound that’s lush with layered pads, juicy guitars, tight rhythms, and solidly written tunes, the rich and quite varied song list starts with the title song which sets the mood, before the stormy collection of melodic alternative rock starts rolling. ‘Strange Game’ is an ambient piece that does an amazing job in tendering the listeners to the thunderous follow-ups, while simultaneously displaying the band’s talent for crafting atmospheres with memorable melodies and putting together chords that sound equally dramatic, practical, and inspired.
The few chords and melodies that live on the title song are delivered via ethereal pads and layered choir vocals. Emotive, the chords are melancholic and dark in the first half of the song, before a gentle burst occurs halfway through, introducing the band’s fluent capability of utilizing chords from outside of the scale to inject color and feeling. The short stunner proves itself to be a perfectly captivating start to a rather immersive listen.
With ‘Don’t Let Me Drown’, which paints Conflict Choir as Muse in their sensible pants, with the song’s bustling and dramatic rhythm guitar part, an immense forward-moving momentum, and palpable drama, the song is an evocative piece of alternative rock. ‘I Feel Fine’ is an expansive and modal piece of Floyd-ish rock that uses hypnotic guitars and subdued vocals to deliver one of the album’s breeziest and most contemplative tunes. ‘The Real Thing’, and ‘Algorithm’, songs we previously covered and were quite smitten by making an appearance on the album’s latter half. With the groovy, rhythmic intricacy of the former that blooms into a massive, reverberated guitar rodeo of a chorus, to the familiar and wholly warm embrace of the latter, with its minimal tempo and scarce arrangement.
Conflict Choir’s debut is as impressive as they can be. Mixed and mastered by Thomas Atlas and Greg Chandler and recorded in a dark garage in Worcestershire, Conflict Choir, a band of veteran sessionists have got it right on the first try.
