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Music can have many forms and purposes. Sometimes you want it to shake you up 'til you're bubbling and ready to face the world, other times you want to have it follow you around, not threatening, just being there. This falls into the latter camp. I put this on and potter about, all the while trailed by the light air. While I clean the bike it sits gently in the corner and when I go to get coffee it's in the kitchen before me, waiting. Maybe it's because the Dogs, Clive Painter and Martine Roberts, record their material in a home studio that makes it so comfortable around the house. You feel if they ventured into the outside world they'd need protection even if they do sing about home as "a crevice in the grass" and "the streets are alive in new ways." No this is a record best kept inside, like a pet on fireworks night. There it can snuggle up in front of the fire, after all they do say they want to "sit in some warm place" and flow away with the gentle waves of their music, catching The Sleepers Sleep of the opening track and "squeeze(d) shut those watery eyes" of the album's closing line. Years ago Mazzy Star gave us 'She Hangs Brightly', and while 'Brighter Now' doesn't boast that brilliance, it still glows with a warmth that drifts along in the currents of the music, from the swirling guitars that open the album, through the chiming percussion of Anchor and onto the ghostly horns of A Silver Canopy. Relax on a Sunday morning with your pipe, slippers a Broken Dog.

Laurence Arnold
October 2001

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