Deep Throat Choir - Be OK

The Guardian 80

(Bella Union)

Under the guidance of celebrity choirmaster Gareth Malone and his hit TV shows, choirs – from NHS to Military Wives – have made a significant dent in the charts this decade. Deep Throat Choir, an all-female, East London-based outfit founded by Luisa Gerstein of experimental group Landshapes, might share the same feelgood factor as those ensembles, but aren’t cut from quite the same tear-jerking cloth. Their saucy moniker promises something more subversive, and belying the sweet, swelling harmonies delivered in this collection of covers and original compositions is an erotic thread that runs from a cover of Amy Winehouse’s typically frank In My Bed to the drunk-in-love sensuality of self-penned opener Ada. Elsewhere, they bring melodic immediacy and calming mellifluousness to various astute left-of-centre choices, including Björk’s Stonemilker, Little Dragon’s Ritual Union and Donnie and Joe Emerson’s lost 1979 track Baby, which was rediscovered and became an underground hit in the late 00s, to delightful effect.

Thu Mar 02 21:30:28 GMT 2017

The Guardian 0

(Bella Union)

Blame Glee or Gareth Malone, but you can barely move these days for community choirs. Life-affirming they may be for the participants, but for the listeners, yet another a cappella version of Lean on Me can get wearisome. The all-female Deep Throat Choir have been refining their drums-and-vocals arrangements under the direction of musician Luisa Gerstein since 2013. The east London collective’s first record consists mostly of cover versions, tackling Björk and Amy Winehouse with cool understatement, while throwing up tasteful curveballs from Sylvan Esso and Electrelane. But a little more vocal wildness in the finale of MK’s 1995 house banger, Burning, and their own composition, Be OK, really distils their full-throated joy.

Sun Mar 05 08:00:38 GMT 2017