Album Notes

"This is one group you absolutely must hear to believe" - www.smother.net/reviews

COUNTERGLOW

Counterglow centres around the dual guitars and voices of Jon Penny and Matt Smith. Their original songs range from energetic alternative indie-rock to intricate fingerpicked ballads, from wry comments on past experiences to deeply-felt views on the modern world.


SHOUT IN VAIN

Shout In Vain was recorded over the summer of 2004, with the 12 tracks covering the full range of Counterglow's music.

STORM and PARADISE open the album with driving rhythms and uplifting harmonies, before the gentler SUNRISE builds to a big climax with chunky djembe percussion.

After the alternative-blues-rock of CAVE IN, the mood again shifts to the haunting melancholic melodies of REQUIEM and FLYING FREE, before ELECTRON WORLD shatters the calm with some Spanish-flavoured guitar.

AVON ST BLUES follows this up with melodic acoustic indie-pop, then another gentle interlude is provided by the lyrical MY TIME.

BE MY VOICE bursts in with almost punk energy and also provides the line from which the album title is taken, after which an intricate finger-picked guitar part builds to the uplifting climax of RESTLESS PAGE.

Finally, listen out for a cheeky choral sample at the end of not-remotely-serious album-closer BUS TO K.Y.D.


As well as their usual vocals and guitar-parts, Jon and Matt also played the other instruments on the album themselves, with Jon laying down the bass-lines and percussion (the latter after many, many takes...), kit drums having been added at Toy Box in Bristol, and Matt arranging the afore-mentioned choral part to provide a fitting end to the CD…

The cover design is by Pete Reed, based around a photo of waiting passengers at Victoria station in London.


"This acoustic duo are set to go very far"
CRAIG MITCHELL, Acoustic Lounge
www.acousticlounge.co.uk