Logo
DiS Needs You: Save our site »
  • Logo_home2
  • Records
  • In Depth
  • In Photos
  • Blog
  • Podcast
  • Search
  • Community
  • Records
  • In Depth
  • Blog
  • Community

THIS SITE HAS BEEN ARCHIVED AND CLOSED.

Please join the conversation over on our new forums »

If you really want to read this, try using The Internet Archive.

Hearts Hearts

Young

Label: Tomlab Release Date: 22/01/2016

102329
tristan_bath by Tristan Bath February 22nd, 2016

From the British side of the English Channel, Austria’s contribution to twenty-first-century indie is damn near undetectable. Most of us would be hard pressed to cite much further beyond Falco and his buddy Mozart when it comes to any century, so the emergence of a band as innately radio friendly and artistically fully-formed as Viennese quartet Hearts Hearts is extremely welcome, and comes as more than a pleasant surprise. This writer moved from England to the Austrian capital at the end of last year, and can happily report back on the city’s very healthy music scene. Vienna’s home to a slew of contemporary bands pedalling highly intelligent indie rock, such as Mile Me Deaf, Sex Jams, and Bilderbuch, but Hearts Hearts manage to stand apart from a busy crowd, blending bountiful meticulous synthetic sonic strands into some damned heartfelt songwriting. While shopping around for label to put out their debut, the group caught the eye of Tom Steinle, who felt inspired enough to have them reignite his Köln-based Tomlab label. Previously home to releases by the likes to Thee Oh Sees, The Mountain Goats, and Owen Pallett, the label had been dormant since about 2012. Quite the seal of approval.

The quartet’s origins actually lie a couple hundred kilometres west of Vienna in the state of Upper Austria closer to the German border. Starting out as something of a singer-songwriter project for members Daniel Hämmerle and David Österle, the music purportedly grew into something more complex as time went on, and years of rehearsal, drafting, and redrafting have lead to the ten crystalline songs (all sung in English it’s worth noting) on their debut Young. The influence of twenty-first-century Radiohead is undeniable, but so’s the shuffling syncopated electronics of the post-FlyLo landscape, along with the icy sparse atmospheres of Sigur Rós, or the blue-eyed-neo-soul of The xx. Central to the band’s success is the stirring vocal work of Österle and Hämmerle. He owns the same angelic whisper as Thom Yorke circa Amnesiac or The Eraser, and ably leaps into some low-key vocal fireworks at several points on the record, slyly breaking his voice while circling the central tune of opener ‘The World Was My Oyster’, and pushing outwards into expanding walls of reverb at the end of key phrases – a trick replicated throughout the record. Österle’s lyrics also consistently match his fragile delivery: “I never take the side road/
I’m riding on the high street
/Afraid to go astray
/Too few gains in this high risk play”.





Behind the lyrics, the several years’ worth of work the quartet have put into the record - plus essential contributions from collaborator and cellist Christina Ruf - really show in the meticulous and mature arrangements. Input from electronics whizz Peter Paul Aufreiter integrates additional textures and layers beyond the pre-requisite keys, drums, guitars, and strings, such as the tinkling of beautifully messy bell samples at the head of ‘AAA’, or the whirring and shuddering glitch pad atmospheres lining the innards of the vaguely Brian Wilson-esque paranoid hymn ‘Potemkinsche Dörfer’. Similarly drummer Johannes Mandorfer wields his sticks, skins, and drum triggers in a mottled wash of rhythms ranging from unraveled drum machine beats reminiscent of Autechre’s teenage years to more straightforward rocking out, plus some far more alien rhythms as on the woodblock-esque tinkerings on closer ‘If’.

Each of Young’s ten tracks is worth pausing over, but a handful stick out as high watermarks in the drama. ‘Hunter Limits’ towards the end of the record is something a bit more epic for the record’s third act, including a gorgeous set of guitar lines from Daniel Hämmerle sparring against Christina Ruf’s cello lines. The swell of this chorus, and the way in which the song navigates its way through soulful synthetic indie to spiralling near-post-rock histrionics is definitely one of the album’s finest moments. The title track’s bed of analogue hi-hats, simmering electro beats, and arpeggiated digital notes builds to a chest tugging climax too, and ‘I Am In’ could practically pass for a Massive Attack outtake circa-Mezzanine, full of beautiful dark space, snappy rim shots, and woozy guitar harmonics.

While there’s no short supply of indie projects striking up a compelling balance between crystalline digital production possibilities and good old songwriting, there’s a huge vacant space for the sheer quality of a band like Hearts Hearts. The atmospheres and melodies they craft are haunting enough to linger beyond the boundaries of the album’s running time, and the tricky nocturnal emotions of the songs leave plenty to dig into and re-examine with each listen. Certainly one of the most arresting debuts in recent years.

![102329](http://dis.resized.images.s3.amazonaws.com/540x310/102329.jpeg)
  • 8
    Tristan Bath's Score
  • 9
    User Score
Log-in to rate this record out of 10
Share on
   
Love DiS? Become a Patron of the site here »


LATEST


  • Why Music Journalism Matters in 2024


  • Drowned in Sound is back!


  • Drowned in Sound's 21 Favourite Albums of the Year: 2020


  • Drowned in Sound to return as a weekly newsletter


  • Lykke Li's Sadness Is A Blessing


  • Glastonbury 2019 preview playlist + ten alternative must sees



Left-arrow

Animal Collective

Painting WIth…

Mobback
102306
102330

Library Tapes

Escapism

Mobforward
Right-arrow


LATEST

    news


    Why Music Journalism Matters in 2024

  • 106145
  • news


    Drowned in Sound is back!

  • 106143

    news


    Drowned in Sound's 21 Favourite Albums of the Y...

  • 106141
  • news


    Drowned in Sound to return as a weekly newsletter

  • 106139

    Playlist


    Lykke Li's Sadness Is A Blessing

  • 106138
  • Festival Preview


    Glastonbury 2019 preview playlist + ten alterna...

  • 106137

    Interview


    A Different Kind Of Weird: dEUS on The Ideal Crash

  • 106136
  • Festival Review


    Way Out East: DiS Does Sharpe Festival 2019

  • 106135
MORE


    news


    The Neptune Music Prize 2016 - Vote Now

  • 103918
  • Takeover


    The Winner Takes It All

  • 50972

    Takeover


    10 Things To Not Expect Your Record Producer To...

  • 93724
  • review


    The Mars Volta - Deloused In The Comatorium

  • 4317

    review


    Sonic Youth - Nurse

  • 6044
  • feature


    New Emo Goth Danger? My Chemical Romance confro...

  • 89578

    feature


    DiS meets Justice

  • 27270
  • news


    Our Independent music filled alternative to New...

  • 104374
MORE

Drowned in Sound
  • DROWNED IN SOUND
  • HOME
  • SITE MAP
  • NEWS
  • IN DEPTH
  • IN PHOTOS
  • RECORDS
  • RECOMMENDED RECORDS
  • ALBUMS OF THE YEAR
  • FESTIVAL COVERAGE
  • COMMUNITY
  • MUSIC FORUM
  • SOCIAL BOARD
  • REPORT ERRORS
  • CONTACT US
  • JOIN OUR MAILING LIST
  • FOLLOW DiS
  • GOOGLE+
  • FACEBOOK
  • TWITTER
  • SHUFFLER
  • TUMBLR
  • YOUTUBE
  • RSS FEED
  • RSS EMAIL SUBSCRIBE
  • MISC
  • TERM OF USE
  • PRIVACY
  • ADVERTISING
  • OUR WIKIPEDIA
© 2000-2025 DROWNED IN SOUND