Luluc has created a soothing afternoon shower far more than a storm in the 10 years since their quiet emergence. Overshadowed somewhat by the roaring success of fellow Aussie folk duo Angus & Julia Stone, theirs was a sound that borrowed more into stark and stripped back honesty than the more heavy-handed and conspicuous emotional tug of their counterparts – gentle buffeting breeze over bluster. That may seem unfair on good old Angus & Julia, maybe even unfair to compare them in the first place, but the similarities are hard to ignore. Emerging around the same time; a ruggedly long haired and stubbled man taking the stage with a woman fair of hair and voice, the Australian drawl thick amongst lyrics of love and loss while acoustic guitars pluck and strum their way through it all. Hell, they even toured together for a while there. But where the heady heights of fame came a-calling for the Stones in both their native Australia and beyond, Luluc took the road less traveled, stopped to smell the roses and found joy in the journey.
To say it was well worth it is beyond fair. Acclaimed by the music world over in peer and publication alike and adored by their loyal cult of followers, the ripples of their work have been felt even if the splash never came. Last year’s Sculptor was universally critically acclaimed, building on the attention of 2014’s Passerby which brought public praise and attention from indie darlings the likes of Wilco, Fleet Foxes, Jose Gonzalez and The National. Indeed, the record was produced by Aaron Dessner and led to Matt Berninger commenting, “I’ve played Passerby on repeat, for months it was the only album I wanted to listen to.” But Sub Pop are now giving the world the chance to go back to where it all began for Luluc, releasing debut album Dear Hamlyn to the world outside of Australia for the first time.
Dear Hamlyn came from the loss of lead singer Zoë Randell’s father, when a moment of disruption led her to refocus her energy on music. The result was an album that encapsulated the utter complexity of heartache and grief within such a discretely simple thing as death, the restrained and unadorned songs utterly moving in their simplicity. The sound hasn’t greatly changed much in the albums since, but it’s a gorgeous trip back to hear the songs that have informed their career since. Randell’s voice and words pack the lion’s share of the punch, her gentle melodies and musings on life fleshed out by the soft strum and pluck of acoustic guitars with the odd flourish of string and brass. With an immediately accessible sincerity in her soft and earnest voice, she lays bare simple anecdotes, moments of wisdom and snippets of storied histories that take on new meaning in the knowledge of the album’s context.
A black umbrella becomes a private shelter for Randell when walking out in the rain, “all the while you did love me, now I know it to be true.” Riches are found in the world around us, “a warm blanket, pattern of the sky, a strong body to cradle you all night” in the ‘The Wealthiest Queen’ and more royalty of nature in ‘Abigail and the Whale’, while a simple secret is kept from us in ‘A Whisper’, “just between you and me, no one else can see, they can’t see what we know”. But it’s ‘Body on the Water’ that lies as a centerpiece, its beautiful chorus of “bup bada bas” a misdirection of a hook against the heartbreak of its words. Randell finds tangled bodies on the water, “twisted lines” marking the pretty face – the realness of what she sees all too tangible. “I drag your body up from the shore and lay you across the sands to dry, why do I come back down here every night? With all the salty water, I cry.” Dear Hamlyn is a wonderful debut from one of Australia’s and the world’s most understated and underrated bands. Do yourself a favor and go back to uncover or rediscover the treasures of their first songs, you won’t regret it.
