It’s not often that a band’s comeback album is also their break up album, but it seems for London trio
Woman’s Hour that transition was a wholly necessary thing.
Then a foursome, Woman’s Hour arrived with a luminous cool in 2014 with their debut ‘Conversations’. Their clean, monochromatic aesthetic brought a real charm to their dream pop ways. This wasn’t the light-in-the-dark movements of Beach House; it was more the minimal cool of The xx as seen through the eyes of Bat For Lashes, something where emotion made up for the sparsity of sound.
However, the period between then and now saw relationships in the band become strained. The band unofficially split during the recording of their second album ‘
Ephyra’. The weight of it all became too much but, rather than just let it fade away, Woman’s Hour reconvened a year later to finish it. ‘Ephyra’, then, becomes transformed into a record of that time.
It’s an unusual process, coming back to the album that was the source of such a fraught atmosphere to finish it a year after calling it quits. Using it as a way of reconciling with their feelings, it makes the result a lot more impenetrable for anyone outside of the room it was recorded in.
With things written so openly as to have titles like ‘
From Eden To Exile Then Into Dust’, it’s clear what Woman’s Hour want to say. But, where ‘Conversations’ felt intimate, ‘Ephyra’ puts up a wall. It’s hard to emotionally attach yourself to it, such is the focus on each member trying to reckon with their emotions. It becomes a cathartic therapy session for the band that keeps the listener on the other side of the door.
