Pikelet
Pikelet
13 Track, LP (2007, Chapter Music)
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Whimsical is probably not the right word for Pikelet – though it’s a word that will doubtless be lazily applied to an artist who writes songs with titles like ‘Princess Mertilda’. Fantastical is a better word, because these imaginative flights are fully realised, and unlikely to blow away on a mere breeze. That the musical universe of Evelyn Morris is built almost entirely out of her voice and a delay pedal is even more the wonder – the layers here are so rich, so varied. Her self-harmonising creates an atmosphere of queasy multicolour, like looking drunkenly through a kaleidoscope. It’s especially potent on ‘A Bunch’, where a basic drumbeat sways along through the song’s middle, flanked by twinkling, Christmas light chimes and Evelyn’s sustained vocal “Oooooohs”. I’ve got no idea what she’s singing about, but the song creates its own convincing logic.
‘Size Matters’ is an immediate contrast – introducing a waltz-time that sneaks in and out of the album – clearing a bare path for plucked acoustic guitar and a vocal melody that sounds like childhood enthusiasm turned noticeably sinister. A walk in the woods, indeed. If Evelyn Morris were the Pied Piper she’d clear villages real quick. I know I’d follow her, ‘Beyond The Sky’ even, a thoroughly enjoyable place of accordion folds and dusted handclaps. It ends abruptly, cutting dead in the middle of a beat, reminding you as a listener that for all this record’s enticing corners and twisted corridors, the power is in Evelyn’s hands. It’s her construction, and it’s a deliberate one. As the song says, ‘It’s Not Childish’.
by Emmy Hennings
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