SPQR take their logical next step with the excellent Low Sun Long Shadows

On the Liverpool trio’s debut EP, The House That Doubt Built, Harrison laid bare his deep-rooted battles with mental illness and his struggles with the world around him. Tracks such as the despairing “Dystopia” and “Suffer” showcased Harrison’s ability to turn his torment into something constructive and, at times, quite beautiful. For all of its moments of morbid introspection, The House That Doubt Built was a desperately moving release, the bands tight and frenetic art-rock dynamics adding to its curiosity.

In that sense, Low Sun Long Shadows carries on where the last EP left off, if a little more polished. “Our Mother’s Sons” is undoubtedly SPQR’s strongest song to date, exhibiting the kind of the explosive tension you might find in a Pile track, with Harrison at his most desperate as he cries “I’m half here, half somewhere else”. It’s a momentous occasion for the band, and an indication of the kind of heights they are capable of taking their music.

The variance in SPQR’s sound, thanks not only to Harrison’s playing but also the performances of drummer Bex Denton and bassist Jack Sanders, shine through elsewhere on “Slowly” and “Josephine”, though it is on closer “This Gore” that the band again highlight the potential strengths to their sound. Despite Harrison showing no signs of rationing his zany and deeply arresting songwriting and singing, the track itself is one of the tightest by SPQR to date. A haunting medley, it expertly ebbs and flows, adding differing beats and sounds as it builds into a mighty final chorus. Not much different to what’s come before, then, but certainly a sign of greater promise than previous material.

And that’s what Low Sun Long Shadows, in essence, is really. Desperate, frantic and exhilarating in equal measure, it is the logical next chapter in the band’s progression as they build up to what will hopefully be their debut full-length. Something which I, for one, cannot wait for.