Whispertown have this really amazing song called Atlantis. It’s from their 2008 record Swim, the follow up to 2006’s Livin’ In A Dream. I’ve been a Whispertown fan for years, they are one of my favourite bands and I love their music so much. Before I even heard Livin’ A Dream I lived off a live recording from a show they played in Houston, Texas, where they covered a Gillian Welch song (Look At Miss Ohio). I knew the song and I loved it and thought it was really cool that they covered it.
The live set is really amazing and they play another of my favourite songs, Hometown. It has this awesome whistle solo in the middle and I love it. Then I picked up the Jenny Lewis/Whispertown split 7″, which had Whispertown’s contributory song, Hometown. I listened to the 7″ so much because the only recording I had of the song was the live version from Houston, and I loved the studio version.
Anyway, what I’m getting at is that Whispertown have a bunch of early material that I fell completely in love with. When I heard they were making a new record I was obviously hugely excited but I wondered if they could make anything that I could love quite as much as the early stuff (of course they could!). I was really anxious to hear the new album, and really keen to hear the studio versions of Mountain and 103 (both of which they performed in their 2007 Daytrotter Session). Mountain in particular was nothing but perfection already. In the same Daytrotter session they also played another new song, Ebb and Flow, which I wasn’t massively into- which is why I wondered how the new album would turn out.
So Swim got released on Acony Records (Gillian Welch’s label- what a beautiful symmetry) in 2008 and I listened and I loved it. Even Ebb and Flow has grown on me alot. Among the songs I already knew, there are so many absolutely wonderful new songs on that record (all of them are brilliant), but there’s this one in particular- Atlantis…
Atlantis drifts slowly in, in between two pretty rockin’, up tempo tracks. It’s this slow, heartfelt, wonderful song that is just so beautiful. The story of Atlantis is that it was this mythical island created by the Greek god Poseidon, as this idyllic place. The people on the island ended up wanting more and more and, to make the story completely un-dramatic, Poseidon got a bit miffed at them and sunk the island. Before it was sunk Atlantis housed a super advance society of talented people, supposedly better than the folk over in Athens. But the whole concept is that it should have been an amazing place, but society ended up being flawed, which is why it got sunk.
In the Whispertown song Morgan’s voice couldn’t be any finer, it’s perfect. The harmonies and the sparse arrangement (it’s just vocals and piano) is wondrous. Morgan sings ‘I want faith, I want faith in everything’, and in the choruses: ‘Atlantis, let me in, I will live free of sin‘. It’s pretty beautiful. The album is called Swim, and she sings this line: ‘learn to swim‘ – which I love even more because in New York Minute, an old song from Livin’ In A Dream, she sings ‘build a bridge or just swim it‘. I love repeated little treasures like that- especially when it spans albums.
Basically, the song is beautiful and I love it alot. Being such a huge Whispertown fan, I was overjoyed to catch their first ever London show in May. For the encore they played one of my old, most favourite songs (Through A Hole), and then, as if they hadn’t done enough swoon-worthy things for one evening, Morgan played Atlantis on the guitar. It was such a huge treat to hear it, it felt really special (they haven’t played it any of the subsequent four times I’ve seen them) and I feels very lucky to have heard them do it.
To summarize (I seem to have written a long post with no point): WHISPERTOWN ARE AMAZING. Get Swim so you can hear Atlantis. Their Myspace is here.
I really love this song by Dinosaur Feathers called Cold Arabella. It’s funny because I have a friend called Arabella and she often says she is cold. SPOOKY. Coincidence? I think not.
Gosh, it’s only been a whole ten days since I last heard live music, but I miss it alot. I remember it being like this last year too, and then to off-set the gig-absence I went to just about anything that was on in January. I’ve still got another couple of weeks without live music. I listen to loads of music every day normally anyway (I ride on the tube quite alot), but for some reason listening to it now is making me want to hear it live so much. There’s something so wonderful about live music. 
Swoon.