Wild Nothing - Gemini

Initially peering above the parapet with his 2009 lo-fi, bruised cover of Kate Bush’s Cloudbusting, Virginia student Jack Tatum returns with his full-length debut, lovingly upholstering 80s anorak indie for a fresh generation. It’s a project that adds little new to the sum of bleary pop endeavour, but it’s carried off with such genuine warmth and detail that you can’t help cherishing these familiar sounds anew.

Tatum, surely the Prince Rogers Nelson of mumbly college rock, handles vocals, guitars, synths and percussion all on his tod. Lack of numbers isn’t obvious, as ‘Gemini’ recalls full-throated band efforts by that impeccable trio of The Smiths, The Cure and Cocteau Twins, stepping up to the plate with jingle-jangle royalty.

But, for all its rich antecedents, ‘Gemini’ is largely unassuming. Coy and airy, ‘Live In Dreams’ freewheels down heather-strewn country lanes, its feet off the pedals, bringing summer with a touch of melancholy. It’s a mood that slithers through ‘Chinatown’’s pair of runaways and light oriental scales, and ‘Confirmation’ with its Asobi Seksu doodlings and stark synth shards – like Super 8 movies, these songs feel gauche, personal but authentic.

The skiffle guitar on ‘Our Composition Book’ brings us right up to date to The Drums (and right back in time to Postcard Records), while ‘O, Lilac’ confirms 80s roots, its louche energy conjuring the spectre of Ultra Vivid Scene. This one’s a standout, all quick-win catchiness and sprightly synth, but hope still fades - “I can’t hold you up…” It’s matched in the happy / sad stakes by ‘Bored Games’, revelling in expressive bass and acid pulses straight out of the New Order archives, and the ‘Be My Baby’-thumping ‘My Angel’ Lonely, decked in black but snake-hipped all the same.

In the end, ‘Gemini”s a curio, seemingly popping up three decades late like a declassified document. Its time has passed, but it’s still fascinating, rewarding, an echo of what was and what might have been.