Perseverance is one of the greatest human attributes. Just ask CLAYHILL: their debut, six-track mini-LP "Cuban Green" finally came together after years of broken recording sessions, poverty and singer Gavin Clark being stuck in Stoke-on-Trent delivering pizzas to make ends meet while his bandmates Ted Barnes and Ali Friend sweated over the songs that would finally grace this record.
But all the hardships were surely worth it, as "Cuban Green" is a smart, snappy debut, with world-wearily funky songs of experience graced by Gavin Clark's gritty, gutsy voice and inventive arrangements abounding, touched on texturally by both trip-hop and the midnight cool of bands such as Red Snapper.
Ultimately, though, this sound is very much Clayhill's own. Opener "Figure Of Eight" is arguably your reviewer's favourite track, with a catchy, finger-picked guitar figure melding beautifully with Friend's rolling, Danny Thompson-style double bass and Black Box Recorder drummer Tim Weller's funky beats. As anthemic as anything here, it also brilliantly employs evocative Arabian strings at the end and gets this writer's immediate endorsement.
Most of what ensues is equally impressive, too. "Face Of The Sun" reminds of Talk Talk (circa "Colour Of Spring") with low-key loops and piano droplets flourishing into an expansive, moody ballad; "Hour Glass" finds a regretful and entirely plausible Clark singing: "Upon the cracks of life we have to tread" like a man who's fallen through more than his fair share and "Kind Of Man" is an equally fine showcase for his gravelly, vulnerable tonsils, stripping back the melody to wring every drop of emotion from lines like: "I'm not the kind of man to catch you when you fall."
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"Grass Cutter," meanwhile, is pretty much the album's signature song, concerning a meticulous gardener spotted by Ali Friend while on holiday in Cuba. The man in question was cutting his lawn with a pair of scissors and in "Grass Cutter" they've fashioned a cracking tribute to his skills. Insistent and faster than most of Clayhill's songs, it blossoms into a lovely chorus with huge fantails of brass and shows this lot can do pure pop if they set their hearts on it. Final track "So Far Out," though, returns us to more familiar funky, loop'n'breakbeat-fuelled heartbreak, with Clark's fragile, personal observations allied to a particularly haunting backdrop.
"Cuban Green," then, is a consistently excellent introduction to a band who've clearly been on first name terms with life's slings and arrows for some time. Their perseverance has paid off well, though, as this debut is something of a triumph over adversity and it's a great appetite-whetter for their full-length album due later this year. Indeed, if there's any justice, Clayhill's finely-honed songwriting skills and textural strengths will finally drag them out of the darkness of the past.
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