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Like overhearing neighbours arguing late at night or peaking through the diary of an ex-girlfriend, Sir are only around for the unsettling moments in life. Using a musical backdrop that even Low would consider sparse, Australian's Elizabeth Downey and Jesse Shepherd paint blurred visions of lost loves and empty lives where no scab is left unscratched. Dipping into dark emotional waters that Nick Cave would swim well clear of, Sir are a depressed Handsome Family hosting a tea dance in a dusky graveyard at 3am or a David Lynch film about relationship counselling soundtracked by Thalia Zedek and Bill Callaghan. Downey and Shepherd themselves are a recently divorced ex-couple and while you certainly wouldn't wish to share a tour bus with them, this peak through their curtains is like viewing a gory yet bizarrely gripping accident that's already long past rescue by any kiss of life. Now as for that difficult album title, let's not discuss it in front of the guests again, right dear?

Ian Fletcher
CWAS #11 - Autumn 2002

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