Following the warmly received Hide & Sleep EP Leander Berlin based brothers Lars and Daniel Kranholdt release their debut album of highly engaging electronic fused pop.

Recorded in a farmyard barn, Leander have created an album of outstanding beauty. Sub zero cool and sincerely touching, harsh yet mellow. Songs that defy you not fall in love with them.

It's a recording as claustrophobic as the granite city streets; as open as infinite country fields. Clean as driven snow, warm as the snugliest duvet.

Lars' penchant for acoustic song writing is juxtaposed by Daniels' fuzzily synthetic affected washes and crunchy beats. On songs like 'Pass Fail' the rhythm spits embers like a log fire,'Forked' is simple banjo and 7a.m tangled keyboard textures, while 'No League' is a night out in the dark, pounding city. Leander can make those leaps from amiable to ferocious without missing a beat.

Highlights include the insistently catchy "Idaho" with its swirl of clicks and heartbreak and stately album closer "Four Days" which slowly unravels to reveal an epic underside.

This debut delivers what you hope to get from an album, a collection of songs with a narrative, a theme, some feeling. An album that grips you from the start and gently insists that you listen to the end.

The band have been impressing with their live set too, revealing a muscular side to their sound, weaving in fierce drumming and acres of feedback to their delicately poised songs. Their recent London debut at the Kennington Rocks But Gently night caused quite a stir and prompted Chris Coco to write in his blog that they were "Far Too Charming".

We wholeheartedly agree.

Thanks for your time, now listen.

Reviews

Manchestermusic

Leander (or alternatively the output of Lars and Daniel Kranholdt) provide a very contemporary Germanic soundtrack. This seems to borrow heavily from a range of British and French artists, interlacing loops and samples with the tasty hooklines of guitar and bass. The lyrics are simple and the ambience pleasant; and you'd expect such an intricate and interesting combination of elecronica and New Order-ish riffs to have come from Manchester. It's from Berlin however; which means it has the chic of blokes in black polo necks mucking around with patch wires, specialist synths and cut and paste software. "Sliding Drifting Sinking" (see also "108") shifts up a gear and that previously referenced guitar sends shivers down the spine as a barely audible vocal drifts overhead. An excellent outing where digitalism clashes with dreamy sombre ballads.

M M M M

Manchestermusic.co.uk

New-Noise.Net

Berlin brothers Lars and Daniel Kranholdt took to the farmyard to record this pop album, following up their devoured 'Hide And Seek' EP. With a simple songwriting combined with effortlessly stylish arrangement animated by raw crunching percussion, 'Pass Fail' is a creature of another kind of pop.

Coming ahead of The Notwist's planned May release of 'You, Me And The Devil', 'Pass Fail' strikes the same chord as their fellow 'Schlanders amazing 2002 album 'Neon Golden'. Crikey, was it that long ago? And the title track and 'Idaho' sound like extras from the 'Neon Golden' stage show, almost flat-pack constructed from the raw and electronically crackling materials.

'Sliding Drifting Sinking' points in a slightly different direction, taking a more direct route with less flutter and more relentless percussion. With partial word samples and such a drive behind it you could be listening to 'Faking The Books'-era Lali Puna. And this mimic of styles continues, with 'And Survive' raking up those beautiful bittersweet memories of Ms John Soda's vastly underrated 'Notes And The Like'. The back/forth stretched out melancholy chords, simple electronic beats and fluttering percussion are joyful and knowing.

And these themes progress throughout the album, Leander are a band picking up the mantle of responsibility for producing top quality pop in the 21st century.

new-noise.net

DOTSHOP.SE

RECOMMENDED ELOQUENT FOLKTONIC **** A beautiful concoction of clipped crunchy rhythms wrapped in hazy swathes of mooginess with stirring acoustic led melodies topped with gentle, touching vocals.

This is a charming creamy debut album from two Berlin brothers (Lars and Daniel Kranholt) on the little lovely London label that gave us PSAPP (under the guise Team LG). As indicated with the Team LG release, "Pass Fail" proves that we can trust Kennington's taste.

LEANDER specialise in warm, engaging electronic pop, with nods towards Tarwater, New Order, Animal Collective and the like; stripped down, simple songwriting backed with electronic flourishes and crunchy beats - uncomplicated but extremely effective.

DOTSHOP.SE