Darlingside

If you replace the S in the band name by a C, you get a little closer to its meaning: With Darlingcide, the quartet from Cambridge, Massachusetts refers to the advice of the writer Arthur Quiller-Couch to kill your own darlings – and cut parts that seem important, but which disturb the tempo and the reading flow: Kill your darlings! This also applies in the figurative sense for the music of Darlingside: Their folk ballads come straight to the point. Despite the musically elaborate design, there is no sound too much, no bow too wide, no arrangement too cluttered. Polyphonic singing, acoustic guitars, violins, banjos, electric elements, a little bit of pathos and good songs combine to form a new version of folk, which has its roots in the 60s as well as in the here and now. Classical arrangements, swelling harmonies and a sense for modern indie rock – and all that with clever lyrics – characterize the songs of David Senft (bass), Don Mitchell (guitar, banjo), Auyon Mukharji (violin, mandolin) and Harris Paseltiner (cello, Guitar). The four trained musicians are all singers too, acting as multi-instrumentalists and putting together every part of their music collectively. Their playful four-vocal art flows through fascinating soundscapes, and the light-footed electronic sounds blend unobtrusively with traditionally plucked strings, ambient guitars, and self-oscillating delays. In early March, Darlingside released Extralife, their third longplayer, a near-concept album full of great and lyrical lyrics – one often almost fails to follow the reveling harmony song.