Yngve & The Innocents - The Sadness Of Remembering

There’s a wonderfully homespun charm to Yngve & The Innocents, suggesting the sign of a wandering and restless muse. This seems appropriate considering mainman Yngve Wieland’s journey in life thus far, born in Germany, raised in rural Ireland and now living in London. ‘The Sadness Of Remembering’ is the band’s debut release and while the title may suggest yet another collection of hairy-faced heartbroken laments to a lost love, the album is in fact full of up-tempo, rollicking folk vignettes.

Wieland is an accomplished songwriter with a heartfelt delivery to match, drawing comparisons with the likes of David McComb from the Triffids and M. Ward. The stripped down, communal feel of the album captures the essence of the bands folk and country infused rock. The addition of Canadian piano player Andrew LaCombe provides an rockabilly feel not so much underscoring rather overscoring Wieland’s tales of rustic tomfoolery. It’s on the fast paced numbers such as recent single ‘You’ll Be Mine’ that the band really succeeds as a unit; Wieland’s vocal seems to be on a race throughout the song with the quick-fire drumming and piano flourishes. At times, however, the band seems less of a unit, soldering on their talents to their frontman’s songs.

Nevertheless, there’s a playful spirit at work throughout ‘The Sadness Of Remembering’ which infuses the band’s performances with a lightness of step and ignites them with a beguiling charm. If Yngve and his innocents haven’t quite managed to fine-tune their melange of rustic influences, the breadth and depth of their debut, delivered in a deceptively casual style, suggests they cannot be far from realising this dream.