Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger’s Midnight Sun found pop/psych/folk/garage troubadours Charlotte Kemp Muhl and Sean Lennon partnering with Brooklyn, N.Y.-based Invisible Familiars, combining their talents to take the group’s sound from deep minstrel forests into a swirling dissonance of psychedelic space.
Every song on this project, released on April 29, 2014, contains some sort of musical anomaly that sends the listener on a sonic search to reveal more secrets.
A follow-up collection to 2010’s intimate living-room recording Acoustic Sessions, and the luminescent electrified EP Le Carotte Bleue, Midnight Sun began with the stifling fuzzy pulse of “Too Deep,” a neon warning from Sean Lennon to “keep holding your breath, because you’re already dead.” The song extracted a feeling of breathlessness from the Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger vocal blend that rings itself out over the psych-soaked guitar mantra. The song was a powerful and dark opener that set the table for the grand feast to follow.
Midnight Sun continued with “Xanadu,” a song constructed like a mystical crystal palace, backwards guitars, and hallucinatory keyboard orchestrations mix and match, while swirling and spreading out into new multifarious colorization’s of music. This recording, taken in contrast to previous GOASTT excursions, was comparable to a new panoramic view of a multicolored alien landscape, which the listener was previously only allowed to glimpse through a cobwebbed keyhole.
The ravaging track “Animals,” was the recipient of an addictive melody, tripped out with funky drums and sunrise harmony vocals that slowly gain the horizon before basking in sunny glory during the expansive chorus. An accompanying must-see video for this song properly conveyed the hallucinatory nature of the track.
The recognizable quirkiness of Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger, so apparent on their debut release, was abundant again in “Johannesburg,” where Muhl takes her first seductive vocal of the collection. This light funk travelogue had a luscious guitar break sweet enough to pucker the lips and was sprinkled with numerous sonic delights. Next, the title track became a delirious stumble into a smoky moist underground of late night ravers, trippers, hipsters and jet setters lining disorienting halls of sound. Wailing sirens and elongated organ flourishes illuminated the narcotic combined guitar/bass central riff.
Already a stage favorite, Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger’s musically diverse opus “Last Call” was given a proper studio reading on this set. Rising from its humble beginnings, the song had taken flight by its well-traveled conclusion, allowing the younger Lennon a moment to show off his soulful guitar prowess. “Devil You Know” was another thick slab of prismatic melodies enveloped in astral echo and reverb. The song developed like a painting being created in front of your eyes in shades of red, with dual vocals and conflicted descending guitar riff as the song’s pulse points.
“Golden Earring” followed, sounding like an ancient melody reverberating through time, gaining electrification along its travels. Sean Lennon’s vocals elicited his mother’s vocal approach in timbre and attitude and slight vibrato. The song then shifts from its strange worldly verse into a set of swinging soul chorus changes. Similar to the aforementioned “Last Note,” Lennon again coaxed some gritty attitude from his guitar, enclosing the song brick by brick around an icy mellotron finish.
The trio of tracks leading to the album’s close, “Great Expectations,” “Poor Paul Getty” and “Don’t Look Back Orpheus” stayed closer to the archeology of the first collection of songs created by the Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger in 2010.
“Great Expectations” was a breezy drift that highlighted all of the songwriting strengths of Sean Lennon and Charlotte Muhl, illustrating a catchy chorus and a well thought-out arrangement. “Poor Paul Getty” has a nice power-pop groove and is possibly the most straight forward of the songs on Midnight Sun. Braided vocals and a tight arrangement highlighted the dulcet quality of the song.
Finally, “Don’t Look Back Orpheus” truly could be an Acoustic Sessions left over – and this is not a bad thing. The song was nestled nicely, like a delicate flower among tall trees. Music-box keyboards and transparent percussion ornately framed perfect the vocals by Muhl and Lennon. They sing as one, skipping through the carnival changes.
Midnight Sun concluded with the melting wax of “Moth to a Flame,” a maelstrom of piercing guitar effects, blinding white noise, dreamy slide and a very Pink Floyd vibe. The wordless sing song vocalizations circulate through the static and madness, lending the song
a beautifully conflicting emotion. “Moth to a Flame” was a massive hallucination to close the album with, and a fitting ending statement for the story of the record.
The alternative universe created by the Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger here is filled with dark undergrounds, vaudevillian aliens, ancient cults and undiscovered worlds. Sean Lennon and Charlotte Muhl again successfully combined art and commentary with diverse sonic accompaniment in an original way that subscribes to no genre except that developed in their own imaginations. With Midnight Sun, Lennon and Muhl dipped their cups into the deep cool water of inspiration, disseminating a variegated miscellany of their collaboration.
