FROM the very first moment that its stoic, jutting riff collided with our ears, it was all too clear that what we were hearing went above and beyond your atypical three minute pop song and signified the arrival of something special.
Now in hindsight, Man Of Moon’s fantastic debut single ‘The Road’ looks like it could be the genesis of a career which is only restrained by the limits of the band’s imagination.
Bursting onto the scene in impressive fashion after honing their craft and playing shows since 2013, very few bands have been subject to the level of high praise that the Edinburgh based duo have been adorned with over the course of this year.
Comprised of Chris Bainbridge and Mikey Reid, the band’s coincidental pairing at their sound engineering course seems almost too good to be true considering the shared vision which they’ve managed to put into practice in such a seamless way.
Impressing throngs of fans during their set at the popular Live At Glasgow festival and alongside The Phantom Band during an Edinburgh gig, they’d achieved quite a rare feat in enabling the hype to spread through sheer word of mouth.
When the single ‘The Road’ made its way from the studio and into the public domain, it sent a chain reaction through the internet’s music pundits and tastemakers; receiving lofty praise from the media and their peers. The majority of the world’s burgeoning bands would see such attention from a debut single as nothing more than a pipe dream, but the undeniable presence which the track possessed and which refused to diminish after repeated listens proved that all of the attention was more than warranted.
Lucid yet vaguely psychedelic and with a propulsive motorik beat to boot, ‘The Road’ boats understanding of restraint and atmospherics along with the impressively ambitious scope of it set the wheels in motion for what’s been a pivotal year in the duo’s formative period.
June would see the band take another important step forward when they strode onto the stage at The Quay for BBC Introducing and delivered a set which only served to heap even more anticipation and expectation as they continued to acclimatise to the limelight. On the same stage the band put on a outstanding performance at this year’s T in the Park and we’re sure to see them around festival fields in 2016 on the back of that success.
Leaving permanent documents of tracks such as ‘When I Wake’ and ‘I Run’ for a fanbase that continued to grow at a rapid rate, the band soon went on to rekindle the flames of hype which enclosed them with the disorienting ‘This World’.
Billed as the B side to ‘The Road’, this in no conceivable way suggests that ‘This World’ isn’t every ounce as magnetic, ingenious and striking as the track which cleared the way for its release. Expressed through lethargy which echoes the apathetic outlook which we all succumb to in times of woe, ‘This World’ and its use of foreboding guitar, hypnotic grooves and poignantly exclaimed chorus demonstrated that the band were far from a flash in the pan and possess a wealth of creativity just waiting to be uncovered.
Now capable of selling out shows with relative ease and with one of their biggest moments supporting The Twilight Sad at Glasgow’s iconic Barrowland Ballroom earlier this month, it’s not hard to discern from the evidence presented that Man Of Moon are on the ascendancy.
Unwilling to follow any blueprint, Man Of Moon are heading off the beaten track and in an entirely new direction, nonplussed by the burden of expectation and preparing to leave us in awe yet again in 2016.
