Hailing from Reading, UK, Sightseeing Crew is only 20 but clearly a very old soul. The first five cinematic and orchestral seconds, reminiscent of 1960s crooner ballads, of his latest album Muffled Ears, the World Sounds Bad Quality will tell you as much.

No judgement here, though – I’m 18 and love 60s music. It’d be the pot calling the kettle… or something like that, I forget how the saying goes.

The album was written and recorded over a year as Sightseeing Crew balanced three jobs. Certainly a tall order, and definitely a reality for many artists today. Frankly, I’m surprised it didn’t take longer – and you’ll understand what I mean once you begin listening to the record.

It’s pretty rare for me to like a fully-instrumental album, as someone who tends to value lyrics a lot. Unless it’s by Sungha Jung or Marcin, that is – and even then, I’d hesitate to commit to writing a full review. Needless to say, Muffled Ears, the World Sounds Bad Quality is exceptional in that regard!

Sightseeing Crew bills this record as a “gritty, psychedelic indie-jazz and post-rock exploration of modern alienation and information overload” and influenced by the likes of Radiohead, Bon Iver, and Pink Floyd. Certainly, he delivers – by stylistically taking us back to a technologically-simpler era of the 40s to 60s, complete with radio imagery and skilful genre-bending.

Sightseeing Crew intended to tell the story of “Static Man”, a protagonist “deluded into believing he’s witnessed an alien encounter, desperate for a witness in a world of digital noise”. It is rather interesting that the album cover is a woman with three eyes and a metal brain instead of Static Man – perhaps she’s the alien? Either way, that album cover perfectly sets up the energy of the album. Now, I have a confession – I somehow missed this vital backstory in my first listen. Looking back with this in mind, a lot more makes sense. Although I can now happily report that this work stands on its own artistic merit, knowing the intended concept will always enrich the work further.

The record opens strong with orchids and yestermillisecond, both of which sound like they could be the opening to an old silent film; I assume this is our introduction to Static Man. orchids is a good benchmark for the genre-hopping this record does – it begins orchestral with lots of strings, a wind section, and brass working in harmony to interlock a rich, sweeping melody. About three-quarters of the way through, though, the jazzier drums, soulful vocals and electric piano kick in.

From there, it’s a seamless transition into the jazzier feel of yestermillisecond. I really appreciate the physical human recordings – it feels warmer and just a little more real in a way I appreciate even through laptop speakers. (Kudos to all of the session players credited! If you’d like to find out more, you can head over to Spotify, click the three-dot menu, and scroll down to ‘Song credits’.)

I honestly didn’t realize this was going to be a largely-instrumental album until this track. I was really feeling it, until I realized about a song and a half later that I hadn’t heard any actual words.

The semi-titular Muffled Ears is definitely living up to the “low-quality lo-fi” promise from Sightseeing Crew, with the opening distorted radio sample over some slightly-tinny drums. The funk guitar instantly differentiates it from the first two songs, signalling a transition into more modern influences. I can appreciate the very funky bass, too – I’d recommend wearing headphones or hooking up a good speaker to fully appreciate it, since it hides a little on my laptop speaker.

Just a quick aside: I listened to this album once with IEMs all the way through for notes, then just on my laptop speaker for reference as I actually wrote the review. This album is definitely one worth plugging in the headphones for – there’s so much sonic detail that kind of gets a little lost in a standard mobile or laptop speaker.

And now back to one of my favourites of this album, the lead single Another Day In Uniform. There’s a lot more of a consistent groove you can get moving a little to, thanks to the drums that switch up fairly often in this song – often enough to keep me on my toes, but never jarring. The saxophone drenched in reverb creates a very unique atmosphere, almost like a slide guitar. This is where I assume Static Man comes into contact with the aliens, as he trudges through his daily life “in uniform”.

As consistent with the rest of the record, the winds are extremely well-arranged with little sweeping flutes and assorted brass – though I must admit, as a guitar player, I’m extremely partial to the bluesy solo about three-quarters through the song! Special shoutout to the rake at 4:21, I went back to listen to it twice just for how satisfying it is.

I kept getting a feeling of deja vu this entire album, and I figured out why at the strings ending to this track – it reminds me a lot of All Roads Lead To Home by Raw Soul, an EP I reviewed just last week. Specifically, the ending to this sounds like track no. 2 Salud – a cool coincidence!

The next three tracks, After August, Pt. 1, Butcher, and Firearm, shift atmospheres into something haunting. Consistently, though, I desperately wanted to know how this album was sound-designed. The opening lead synth of After August that kicks in after the violin sounds akin to the default digital synthesiser Vital preset, but so much prettier in terms of being round, warm, and open. They all mellow out considerably after the relative high energy of the last few tracks.

My favourite feature of Butcher is the guitar panned right, allowing the bass to take a much stronger centre stage. The haunting gets a huge multiplier here, and so does the melancholy.

It was at this point I realized that Sightseeing Crew is making his point not in lyrics, but in emotions and instrumentals. It means something that the electric guitar is a gradual influence – representing technology? Perhaps Firearm’s eerie slide guitars are a callback to the air raid sirens of the past? Or maybe that’s the ex-Literature student in me reaching a little for the symbolism. The title combined with Another Day In Uniform does make me wonder if this is commenting on the post-war period of the 50s and 60s, as eras heavily influencing this record.

These three songs honestly didn’t stand out to me, relative to the strength of the other tracks. There were standout moments, like the introduction of and riffing between the guitar and brass in Firearm – but the other songs just feel much tighter. That said, there is no noticeable drop in objective quality – there’s still development and movement within and across each piece.

Next is my personal favourite, Kiss from the Sun & Learning to Count. The title signals new beginnings, and the music delivers – it feels like a breath of fresh air. A bittersweet, hopeful flute solo makes up much of the opening section. After that, the piece seems to open up into a sort of big-band number, and calms back down into a series of guitar solos that had me closing my eyes to appreciate fully. The Radiohead influence is pretty apparent here, especially in the bends.

Window makes me feel like sitting by a café window to people-watch. It’s very much smooth jazz in a mellow big-band number, balancing out the louder dynamics and crash cymbals with periods of softness. Sightseeing Crew has, in general, played very well with dynamics to not fatigue the listener across this 45-minute auditory experience. I do believe this track is its best display, where you can immediately hear sections swelling and dipping and constantly in flux – and before you know it, Sightseeing Crew has played a little trick on you and you don’t believe believe 5 minutes of just sitting and listening to this track have already passed.

Beginning to close the album out, Bonbon and Planets share similar energies and even a little of the drum grooves. Bonbon is easy listening jazz, except with strings that unsettle me a little. I did think that for a 6-minute track, a little too much time is spent with the haunting strings. The track really picked up for me half-way, and three-quarters through Sightseeing Crew rocks a solo that sounds like it came right out of 80s rock. I will admit that the ending is mildly messy, with the strings and guitars trading off especially around 5:23. In a way that watching my favorite girl group have an adlib-off might sound messy – that is to say, organised chaos that becomes ear candy.

Planets is much calmer, winding down the energy. The simple drums largely exit to bring us back into a purely orchestral-plus-bass instrumentation we began with.

And unfortunately, all good things must come to an end. With Reprise, we return to the jazzy, orchestral, cinematic feelings we started with. It’s notably a lot simpler than the instrumentation of the middle portions – but no less cohesive or intricate. It ends with a violin, though there is a little of what I assume to be a synth underlying it and fading out together.

The track order must be commended; it’s smooth, cohesive and best experienced in one sitting as all the best records are. Personally, my top tracks from this album are Muffled Ears, Another Day In Uniform, Kiss from the Sun & Learning to Count, Window, Planets and Reprise. (Yes, I realize I’ve named basically half the album.) This entire record consistently has so many layers, weaved together with great intention until they blend into each other seamlessly. If I tried to name every layer, which I consider myself pretty okay at, I’d probably still be here until tomorrow!

Overall, while some parts may be stronger than others, the entire record comes together exceedingly well to tell a story start-to-finish. The writer in me is very excited about the concept – I had to restrain myself several times in the writing of this review to focus on the music, and not invent Static Man an entire backstory and narrative arc.

I’ve heard a lot about the death of the album in the era of singles. And to that I’d like to say: as long as people like Sightseeing Crew are out here creating stories of records like this, the album will keep kicking on. Muffled Ears, the World Sounds Bad Quality is the type of record people will keep on their wall of vinyls to spin and have a chat about when friends are over – a relic of a bygone era that we should really bring back.

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