Culture

Rating: 3.5/5
Despite a lack of diversity or adventure, Mali Mali has produced an impressive debut.

Mali Mali is a North Shore trio fronted by singer-songwriter Ben Tolich. Drawing influence from artists such as The National, Sigur Rós and Bon Iver, Tolich writes acoustic, vaguely folky music with a knack for sentimentality and atmosphere. Gather ’round the Gooseclock, Mali Mali’s debut album, is by no means groundbreaking or innovative, and truthfully, it never really tries to be. Tolich aims for a more ambient, eclectic incarnation of the style of acoustic music made in New Zealand over the last couple of decades, and he succeeds.

Gather ’round the Gooseclock opens with “Pages,” which, after a number of listens, is probably my favourite track. A stuttering lo-fi beat lays the foundations for a series of slow, melancholy piano chords, soon complimented by acoustic guitar, violin and Tolich’s pleasant but undistinguished voice. His lyrics don’t seem to say much in particular, simply painting a series of pretty panoramic pictures, all trees and birds and slow-moving rivers.

The second track and lead single “Song For The Sun” veers a little close to that Don McGlashan kind of saccharine softness, but is saved by a genuinely beautiful falsetto chorus that is likely Gooseclock’s finest moment melodically. The differences between the following seven songs are slight, generally distinguished by an instrument (such as the pattering brushes of “All The Sky Will Congregate” or the gossamer synth that whispers in the background of “Bury”). The only real exception is “Magnetic North,” the complex beat of which wouldn’t sound out of place on Massive Attack’s first album Blue Lines.

For the most part, Gooseclock is 35 minutes of predictable yet perfectly lovely acoustic music that, due to its sleepy nature and lack of drastic variation, ultimately becomes a pleasant blur. From this promising start, Mali Mali can either jettison the glints of experimentalism and evolve into yet another that-song-from-the-NZ-Post-ad band, or bring a few more exotic elements into their sound and become one of New Zealand’s finest contemporary bands. Let’s thumb them up on Facebook, do our best to head along to one of their shows, and hope for the latter.