Album Review: Klak Tik – Must We Find a Winner

Klak Tik – Must We Find a Winner            (2010, Safety First Records)

Klak Tik’s textured Must We Find a Winner has a distinct taste for the theatrical, majestically carried out for just under an hour.

The London-based band have produced an impressive debut; each song taking the listener on a wave of percussion, horns, strings, and harmonies to be washed up ashore in dramatic fashion. The most enchanting aspect is the ease with which Soren Bonke, Klak Tik’s main man, allows each song to evolve and be taken by the musical current, while maintaining a definite theme throughout. Bonke’s award-winning soundtrack work, alongside the ample amount of instruments seemingly at the band’s disposal, has stood Klak Tik in good stead.

The crisp production of Must We Find a Winner is made even more impressive by the fact that the whole album was recorded in Bonke’s East London apartment (a live/work warehouse space within a converted redbrick relic left over from the industrial revolution). As Soren explains:

“Live/Work is exactly what it was. A bed in the middle of a music studio. If you were having a good ol’ toss and turn in your sleep you would sometimes bash an overhanging ride cymbal, or crack your head on the low G of a vibraphone. The upshot was that you were somehow always making the album.”

The ease with which instruments were to hand is well reflected in the album’s composition. A highlight comes from “I am Your Memory”:

Klak Tik – I Am Your Memory

“The music we made as we went,” Soren explains, “never rehearsing or too old in our minds. I had previously been experimenting with a kind of track by track improvisation to create layered compositions and although I would normally have written a more or less finished version on the guitar first, a lot of the important decisions were made relying on intuition a lot.”

This dramatic nature of the recording process is apparent throughout, adding a dangerous feel to the album rarely heard in non-audience based recordings. The song “With Ernest & George” shows off Klak Tik’s sense of adventure, exploring the creative waters where their musical wave will take them.

The birth of their label, Safety First Records, like the creation of Must We Find a Winner, happened organically:

“The idea of spending time searching for a label and trashing out a contract,” John Beyer of Klak Tik writes, “seemed so contradictory to the recording process that we decided to do that ourselves.”  It should be noted that Klak Tik are predominately a three piece, consisting of Soren, Beyer, and Matthew Mitchinson, but are often joined by five others for live shows to accommodate their sound. After working as a band in the UK since 2008, Klak Tik had “come to realize that London wasn’t the answer to all musicians’ dreams and, in fact, a slight hindrance.” As John Beyer further explains, “there is very little sense of community and musicians can end up fighting for survival rather than helping each other.” The establishment of Safety First Records, in the same way as Beep Repaired, Dandelion Gold, and (of course) Ball of Wax in Seattle, set out to be a platform “for our friends and kindred musical spirits to release from and hopefully benefit from any success.”

Safety First Records’ second release (Must We Find a Winner being their first jump into “the unknown world of business”), comes from Jack Cheshire and his album Copenhagen. Future releases include albums from Polly Tones and Furnace Flowers (who follow with Jack Cheshire in the “rare gems” category of bands Klak Tik have gigged with around London), as well another Klak Tik record in the near future.

Check out, and keep up to date with, our London cousins at Safety First Records.  In the meantime enjoy this rehearsal of Catholic Suicide, the 10^th tune on Klak Tik’s excellent debut.