Vessels – Elliptic
I was walking through the forest of Latitude Festival on the Sunday evening, as the sun set golden in the west and splayed the trees’ shadows into sly slivers of witchcraft, when I heard the most amazing music.
It was waves of surging electronica, straying over the dust-laced light. Following the wooden sign for the Alcove Stage, down a winding path in the woods, I found a white tent crammed full of dancing revellers. And the band they were all watching: Vessels.
Sadly I couldn’t stay long in the electro-clash court, as the last train to London called, but long enough to find out who the band were for a later date Google. Having been listening to Vessels for some hours this morning, I can confirm their music is as beguiling and intriguing on record as when chance heard in the tipsy last minutes of a sun-soaked festival.
They have an element of a less-poppy Clean Bandit, where the vocals have faded away to let the music hold reign. The Sky Is Pink is perhaps their best-known song according to YouTube listens, itself an epic trawl through bleeps and symphonies, but the track that had ensnared me was Elliptic.
Beginning with a crash, scream and urgent bell-beat, the drums creep in staccato rhythms, before a sheet of orange warning climbs strangely. There are odd sounds in this melody: the whistling of wind in trees; faraway nighttime howls of nature.
But at 2:45 we realise all that we’ve heard before has simply been a momentous build to the grinding, dark truth of the track. Suddenly a bass that’s been prowling in the background pounces to the fore, a riff of gods’ work and fast-rolled tobacco thunder churns through the song’s core. If this music soundtracked a film, this would be the point where the emotion reaches its apex.
Until all melts away to a beautiful keyboard melody: fast, magical and alive with ivory and indigo. In those Latitude woods lit by dying light, this music could have been sylvan spirits chased by the wolves of growling drums. As the musicians played and the crowd swayed it seemed like there was some collective ecstasy happening, stemming from music rather than drugs. I love lyrics in music, I shiver at the haunt of human song, but the emotions in this instrumental come second to none.
As I walked away, I thought: ‘one day, I’ll come back, and dance the night away.’