The Valery Trails - The Sky Is Blue

 

Brisbane based Trio The Valery Trails have offered up a wonderful album. It also reminds me of how difficult and frustrating genre labelling is. There is no doubt that The Sky Is Blue is Indie but Indie what? Not Rocky enough for one genre and too unlike Indie Pop which is generally full of Dream Pop. 

So what do you label this Indie Guitar Pop as? I know labels are pointless, but they do drag new fans in. However, The Valery Trails are wonderfully inventive, but not stuck in any one place. The every day punter wouldn't think of them as typically Australian with one exception. Make No Mistake is very very Go-Betweens, impressively so.

Maybe has a real IRS Indie Guitar Jangle and After The Show has a splendid Orbison Twang. The Sky Blue is wonderfully caught between Glasgow 1986 and Paisley Pop. There But For The Grace has that twang again but this time it is more in Mitch Easter territory.

These Times starts with a Girl Band 60s Intro then becomes more San Francisco 1967 and Zancudo goes all gentle Psych Pop. Sometimes is more UK Late 1970s New Wave than anything and works beautifully, underlining how varied the album is.

See My Fall is a little hippy trippy, but a little Canterbury with an absolute killer chorus. But there is no doubt what the showstopper is. Jaisalmer contains everything you could want in an Indie Guitar song, plus there is a fine intervention of Brass.

There is a real chorus hook. It compares to so many different times with the Jangle of The Windbreakers, the Brit Pop of say Northern Uproar and yet remains indelibly UK mid 80s. The Sky Is Blue is a top notch listen, a real example of how Pop and the Guitar can take you into so many joyful areas.

You can listen to and buy the album here.

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