Majical Cloudz - Are You Alone?

Majical Cloudz have always been a deeply emotional band. The band’s breakout, 2013’s ‘Impersonator’, was enough of an affecting listen. ‘Are You Alone?’ takes the instrumentation displayed there and makes it even more sparse, amplifying and isolating vocalist Devon Welsh’s words to a point where they’re never removed from being the absolute focal point.

The blankness filled with Welsh’s never-ending, tossing and turning storytelling is striking in its clarity, and the delivery of every love letter, apology and wish throughout ‘Are You Alone?’ is stunning. When the album’s first line reads “those that forever disappear, all I want is for you to talk to me the way you used to do,” it sets a precedent for a full-length that barely lifts the mood above one of excruciating emotion, and provides a gloom that lords over ‘Are You Alone?’.

Organ sounds for the album were recorded at studios in Montreal belonging to Arcade Fire and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, and shine brightest on ‘Silver Car Crash’, a track which soars both vocally and in its shimmering instrumentation, projecting a perfect harmony onto its more than slightly bleak subject matter (“I want to kiss you inside a car that’s crashing / and we will both die laughing”).