Here it is. A single by an artist unknown to me that is just different and interesting enough to make reviewing it a pleasure. This is a track of soulful beauty and a sense of the writer believing in his music rather than writing a song that might be a hit. This is cool. That is a word that is used far too much but in this case there is no better word to sum up both the sound and the feeling of this.
Conil has a voice full of earthy emotion and tone making his songs powerful and captivating.
Strange Part Of The Country is slow and dirty, dark and moody. It should be heard in basements of bars where the smoking laws are flounted and the audience sits on beaten up sofas sipping luscious cocktails as the band sit on an old wooden chair and are picked out by a harsh white spotlight through streams of smoke. They are a band that should be discovered by walking into a pub because it is raining and you are needing to get into the warm and dry and as you walk through the door, you hear a vocal that charms you into staying until the early hours of the morning so you leave with the first rays of a dawning sun.
Few singers can carry off melancholy slow vocals and so many who attempt it are left sounding out of their depth. Not so with
Conil. This is a band who excels in such bitter-sweet lyrics, harmonies and vocals. That alone should be enough to seek them out and listen to some of their tracks.
Conil are from London but their sound is much more than the urban music so often heard from the Capital. In an industry that is so full of the mediocre and middle of the road boredom of chart music, this is certainly a genuinely pleasing break from the norm. Radio 6 are championing
Conil and rightly so. A true gem on a coalface.
Strange Part Of the Country is due to be released on 31st March through
Great Hare Records MySpace 
