let’s have some coffee, and talk about poetry.

In an ideal world, diver would by now need little introduction. After an intense 2011, full of homebound shows and gigs abroad, co- and headlining and playing in art galleries, a music museum, in theaters and clubs of various shapes and sizes, they’ve become the troubadour shining star of house Ink. Sadly, on many blogs (including mine) the German-Austrian trio comprised of Wolfgang Bruckner, Olaf Schuberth and Stephan Ebert has been overlooked. Funnily enough, I’ve actually enjoyed every minute of their debut EP, released last spring; sweet and self-contained, with a beautiful hand-sewn sleeve that gives it the extra personal touch (props to the art department!), it was a luscious release, an exciting homerun in a universe of second and third base hits. And so we come to tonight, an evening highlighted in my calendar, as diver will be presenting their debut album Kites to the world – and by world I mean the Viennese public, unless there are secret plans of livestreaming the show to the rest of the planet I do not about – in the cosy TAG theater.

Kites landed in my mailbox at the end of last year, and after a somewhat startling beginning with Illusions, which felt bleaker than my memory remembered it, I started nodding in approval. Sure, Kites feels a little different than the previous engaging EP – as if a homebody, possibly the fairy Godmother, sneaked into their studio overnight to dust away the hand-clapping, iron out the wrinkles in the melodies and straighten out the lyrics – but eventually, you notice that some of the elements that made the EP so special have been kept as is, and that their collective voice is still alive and strong, sometimes more subtle, sometimes ironic, but always present and always honest. The absolute gem on the record is the first single Summer, with its almost bitter tone, its theme of transient love, and my favorite part, the bridge with the intertwined “I should have known it from the start”: don’t tell anyone, but I could kill for a chorus like that. And just to make sure everyone would fall in love with that track, they’ve made an unbearably pretty video for it, too.

In diver‘s music, there is little straying away from emotions. That’s okay because – let us stereotype for a moment here – I’m a girl, and I like it. I also like the voice at times reminiscent of Chris Martin, the good kind, the early Parachutes-days kind, and the way the instruments are keeping a low profile – with a mention of strings here, some subtle melodica there, the drums’ moment of glory in trackĀ No Release, diver have learned their lesson well: accompanying instead of covering. And so from track one to track ten, the listener is being pulled along a bizarre road, full of ambushes – crude realities, a girl who falls in love in London, childishly scratching things on the wall and making promises to someone with whom we have no future, living with a person who is “caught by endless possibilities” and might never come home. In spite of lines like “don’t go, don’t go, don’t leave me here” (Fear) or “I don’t eat these days” (Bones), we tag along managing to keep our optimism intact somehow.

What does this tell us? Maybe love isn’t always forever. Often it’s transitory, and most of the time that’s okay. We’ve all been there, sliding over the very last track aptly namedĀ 1, 2, much, with the head glued to the pillow and a terrible headache and, what’s worse (or better?), an almost-stranger of the opposite sex (or same sex, if so inclined) wandering in your apartment. A tongue-in-cheek to the players and a bit of irony thrown at the dreamers, Kites ends with a light-hearted touch – even though it never really broke our heart in the first place.

diver will be presenting their new album “Kites” at TAG theater on January 25th, 2012; Photo by Nikolaus Ostermann.

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