Old Smile

Listening to my HypeMachine favourited blog-list whilst doing a bit of writing, two bands caught my attention enough to write a mental note to find out their name once I'd finished these few sentences - one with some wonderful psychedelic and jazzy pop reminding me of Connan Mockasin, the other bare and beautiful folk. Upon finishing the sentences and researching the names of these bands, the two bands were in fact just one, and this band was Old Smile.

Old Smile is apparently the project of a Tom Herman, who is apparently also of the band Arches (who maybe I should check out more of). This information isn't particularly important. What is important is that the music of Old Smile, and EP Hawkins Bridge, is lovely.

On his bandcamp, Tom tags himself with "ambient", "pop", and "psychedelic", which gives a good insight into his sound. "Mirrors" opens with a Portishead-like walking bass-line and rattling, jazzy snare rolls; slowly opening up with Tom's unusually high-pitched and effected vocals (again the Connan Mockasin comparison is relevant) and gently echoing guitar strums. "Swept Up With The Tide" continues in beautiful, psychedelic tendencies, this time with clear folk influences and "Want To Be" has at least a few Deerhunter moments - the EP rumbles and crackles, like the record you'd expect to hear in the basement of a vintage furniture store.

Stream and download Hawkins Bridge below, or do the same at their bandcamp. You can also purchase the cassette from Treetop Sorbet