The Robot Heart

The Robot Heart is a quartet described by lead vocalist Tom Marsh as a “family of musicians”, resulting in a real intimacy. Born out of Marsh’s struggles with substance abuse, heartbreak and the deaths of several close friends, it’s reflective, but ultimately affirming material.

Lyrically simple, somewhat repetitious in places – this music achieves a lot of its emotional resonance through an emphasis on melody and haunting vocal harmonies performed by Marsh, Astra Forward, Bob Dingle and Dan Ladd. Indeed, Raining Stones, devoid of lyrics save a lush intermingling of “ahs” and “heys” by the four voices, arguably sums up what The Robot Heart does best: gentle acoustic music to relax to, made just challenging enough by its subtly insistent drum beats and occasional forays into electronica.

This is not to say that the album serves only as background music; it should also be appreciated in greater depth, as a deeply personal and surprisingly soothing meditation from a man who, to quote the title track, is Singing to the Ghost of his past. www.myspace.com/therobotheart

Grace Henderson