Beequeen - Sandancing

Honeyed stings of sweet pop ambience

Beequeen have always seemed to inhabit a perverse fairytale-like place where menace forever threatens to engulf a stuttering ambient calm. While the Dutch pairing of Frans De Waard and Freek Kinkelaar have never been afraid to shine a little light into their tension-fuelled soundscapes, with the introduction of vocalist Olga Wallis into their universe the group have found an earthly representative worthy of conveying their visions.

She is at her finest on Beequeen’s most elegiac tracks, which proudly display their finely-crafted pop mien. While the Stereolab-esque The Honeythief is a delicate miniature marvel that coasts along on the crest of a continental wave, the real showstopper is the malevolent lullaby of The Maypole Song, where Wallis’ voice combines with Kinkelaar’s for an otherworldly pagan nursery rhyme that brings a smile to the face and sends shivers down the spine. While it may hold true that the remainder of Sandancing fails to be as captivatingly joyous, simply ebbing away as if all the magic dust had previously been used up, there is still plenty here to convince of Beequeen’s uniquely subtle alchemy.

3 stars 3 stars 3 stars

Important | Imprec 177

Reviewed by Spencer Grady
<< Back to Issue 352

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