Hana Piranha, West of The Moon - EP review
New Zealand-born, Brighton-based Hana Piranha has released a taster EP to build up to a full album release of her current project due out in three months.
West Of The Moon EP consists of three of the tracks that will feature on that forthcoming LP, to be called Wednesday’s Child.
Hana Piranha – fronted by Hana Maria – sound so different here to the deeper rock sound of the full band that she formed in 2011 and has so far released three records together. That is because the rest of the band aren’t here.
Maria met Los Angeles-based producer and multi-instrumentalist Jason Achilles on a US tour. The pair struck it off and have worked together towards this new venture as a duo.
The album is a co-production joining Achilles’ Organic Audio Recorders studio in Los Angeles with music conjured up by Maria with fellow musicians in England. West of the Moon, the title track of this EP, also adds the notable Steampunk cellist Unwoman, with whom Maria has played previously in San Francisco.
So the result is a kind of classical Steampunk vibe that mixes Maria’s warbling vocals with strings to build up a more atmospheric and vulnerable sound to her music.
The problem is, it doesn’t work.
Maria’s voice just doesn’t seem to suit this style at all. She has commendably put herself out of her comfort zone and embraced her classical training, but she often seems out of sorts with the music accompanying her and like a badly cast actress in a musical film that needed somebody else to fill the role.
Lullaby’s instrumentals are emotive enough, with her violin strong enough to carry the track forward with its sorrowful cries.
The title track is an instrumental number that is the strongest of the three tracks here. It has a real forward momentum, and sounds doggedly determined to reach its goal with Unwoman’s cello starring.
But closer Eurydice is more frustration than enjoyment, particularly with the grating chorus where, again, the vocals wobble and fall flat.
The full record appears to take on a concept story with each individual track a part of the fabric. It remains to be seen whether it makes more sense in its complete form.
Rating: 4/10
Hana Piranha play at Birmingham’s Tower Of Song on March 8
