''Further'' is the second

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

by the English band

Flying Saucer Attack Flying Saucer Attack is an English space rock band formed in Bristol in 1992, led by songwriter David Pearce. Rachel Brook (now Rachel Coe) of Movietone was a member during the band's early incarnation; other musicians contributing to the gro ...

. It was released through Drag City on 17 April 1995.

Composition

Ned Raggett of

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

said that with ''Further'', "the twosome achieved a new balance of delicacy and power, heightened in noticeable part by Pearce's increasingly assertive singing. His vocal approach of extended sigh as singing hadn't changed, but his words had a new clarity and crisper delivery, with fine results. Otherwise, FSA stayed the same general course musically, but again the arrangements provide the difference, with the unplugged folk side of Pearce's music now firmly taking the fore on everalsongs, often with gentle reverb or extra studio effects that make the songs all that much more intriguing. It's not quite

Bert Jansch Herbert Jansch (3 November 1943 – 5 October 2011) was a Scottish folk musician and founding member of the band Pentangle. He was born in Glasgow and came to prominence in London in the 1960s as an acoustic guitarist and singer-songwriter ...

or John Fahey redux, but there's a definite sonic connection there that's well worth the hearing." Despite signing to Drag City, "no compromises were aimed at radio-friendly unit shifters." Mark Richardson of ''

Pitchfork A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to th ...

'' said ''Further'' contains "a little bit of everything—evocative instrumental miniatures, folky near-songs, extended spatial explorations—that made them good. There's plenty of fingerpicked acoustic guitar amid the white-noise din, and the bassy pulse of analog noisemakers floats in and out, evoking the spaciness of early '70s synth music. Pearce's voice, a husky tenor indeterminate pitch, is as buried as a voice can possibly be, but despite his extreme limitations as a vocalist, he manages to communicate melancholy, alienation, and loneliness."

Songs

Opening track "Rainstorm Blues" features a roaring feedback squall that both ascends and descends in volume and gets further accompaniment from "hard-to-place crumbles and squeals, Brook's growling bass work setting the mood even stranger." The "majestic" second song "In the Light of Time" features "clear acoustic notes cutting through hum and drone." "Come and Close My Eyes" features buried waves of electric guitar in counterpoint to gentle picking and is accompanied at the end with "what sounds like a

typewriter A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...

, without sounding jarring or out of place." Richardson said it is "structured enough that you could almost see someone covering it." It is followed by the extended, multi-part fourth track "For Silence", an example of Pearce's unplugged folk side taking to the fore. The fifth song "Still Point" shows Brook getting "a lovely moment of vocal glory." Raggett noted that her voice sounds "even more soft and restrained than Pearce's, rising through a striking squall of sound and, once again, upfront acoustic guitar." Richardson said that on the song, Brook's "slightly warmer tone" of voice breaks "the illusion that Pearce is the last person in the world." "To the Shore" is a "gnarly" instrumental that "moves from a cymbal tap to churning sonic violence and back to delicate acoustic guitar over the course of 12 minutes."

Critical reception

Upon its release,

Simon Reynolds Simon Reynolds (born 19 June 1963) is an English music journalist and author who began his professional career on the staff of ''Melody Maker'' in the mid-1980s. He has since gone on to freelance and publish a number of full-length books on music ...

, writing for ''

Melody Maker ''Melody Maker'' was a British weekly music magazine, one of the world's earliest music weeklies; according to its publisher, IPC Media, the earliest. It was founded in 1926, largely as a magazine for dance band musicians, by Leicester-born ...

'', gave ''Further'' a rave review and called it "the best pure-guitar LP since

Royal Trux Royal Trux was an American alternative rock band active from 1987 to 2001, reuniting in 2015 but disbanded once again in 2019. It was founded by Neil Hagerty (vocals, guitar) and Jennifer Herrema (vocals). History While still a teenager, Hagerty ...

's '' Cats and Dogs''." In 2016, ''

'' ranked ''Further'' at number 26 on its list of "The 50 Best Shoegaze Albums of All Time".

Track listing

References

{{Authority control Flying Saucer Attack albums 1995 albums Drag City (record label) albums Domino Recording Company albums