Pumajaw - Favourites

Offering a retrospective of the duo's first four albums, Favourites revisits some of the key recordings by Pinkie Maclure and John Wills, made between the years of 2000 and 2006. This release helps put into perspective the band's acclaimed Curiosity Box full-length, charting Pumajaw's development from the From Memorial Crossing era (which encompasses the stripped trip-hop and dub tinted sounds of 'Sorcery' as well as the echoing folk dreamscape of 'Buttons'), right up to the more traditional fare of 2006's Becoming Pumajaw. The band's songwriting retains a sturdy and steadfast resolve throughout, suggesting a gloomy yet progressive creative mindset that doesn't shy away from technology or the avant-garde. On 'We Spin' (also from the band's 2000 debut) the group are at the height of their powers, sounding almost no-wave in their embrace of machinated rhythms, thorny sax lines and wild vocals, finding themselves some distance away from the fingerpicked gothic and concertina of more conventionally folk-oriented material like the no less impressive 'The Bending Wood'. Recommended.

... indeed... HIGHLY recommended: like a mellower, smoother Dead Can Dance.

I like'em.