Pale Fire

Pale Fire

(palefireglasgow.bandcamp.com)

The bar on the Scottish music scene has been raised so high in recent years that an album self-released on Bandcamp might well sound better than many brought out on well-known labels. Case in point: the debut from Coatbridge's Pale Fire, richly recorded by Jamie Savage at Chem 19 studio (I even caught myself admiring the drum tone on Arms For Orphans). The five-piece still have some way to go, however, in terms of establishing a credible distance between a distinctive style of their own and the dominant influence of Frightened Rabbit and The Twilight Sad, although they've certainly got the tuneful head of the former and are less tightly coiled than the latter. To that end, I like it when they push their melodic rock to the fore - Sleep The Horses is where The Gaslight Anthem should be, had they not fallen so spectacularly off the path a couple of years ago. That's just a personal preference though: every track here brims with good tunes and intriguing lyrics.

Alan Morrison