This is my first trip along the waterfront with the good ship Seafarer Fables, and it’s quite a laid back, enjoyable jam by the name of Stanislaw Lem.

Seafarer Fables is the project of Kiwi Kelvin Bannan, now based in Melbourne Rock City. This is his first single following a hiatus, and I have to confess I dig it. Alongside Melbourne based producer Connor Black-Harry, Kelvin wrote the track, with quite a different, more avant-garde direction based on his changing perspective of life since he debuted in 2016. From the EPK: “Stanislaw Lem uses the metaphor of a space exploration journey, with some of the novelties about living and being in orbit,” explains Kelvin, “but it’s about our own journeys living abroad and traveling to new unusual/unexpected places. It is a reflection of what home is, and perhaps missing, or thinking, of a particular place or period in life.”

We have a nifty little acoustic guitar strum anchoring the mood and tempo, set quite middly instead of low down or trebly, giving it the feel of being the principal weapon of choice as opposed to an enhancement for the rhythm section. Very subtle bass and minimalistic percussion allows for a wee bit of jazzy electric guitar extrapolation, which itself is nicely held back and sparse. This serves to increase its effectiveness in the mix, so well done chaps.

I do like Kelvin‘s baritone. It’s rich and comes across as somewhat whimsical. The melody is easy to follow, and some nicely timed and toned BVs pick it up where it needs to be emphasised. Very nicely thought out, temporal and deep as a composition.

The video on the You Tubes is absolutely wonderful! Shot in Parque Dos Poetas in Lisbon, Portugal and directed by Portuguese native Andre Abratini it came across to me like something from the original 1930s season of Flash Gordon. A black and white video depicting early 20th century silent expressionism and, from the EPK, a touch of Dadaism. It follows the theme of the lyrics with the visuality of space travel, and adds a message of time travel for the fun of it. Really cool to watch, and the timing of the shots and sequences hits well with the audio.

It’s introspective and arty. I would guess quite a wide range of radio and TV would pick this up. It’s minimalist indie, but very nicely balances when in the headphones or on the speaker. It would do well with the listener while driving, doing something busy with the phones in, and a lot of other activities including sitting down and doing nothing more than simply listening (bliss). It’s on the Spotify playlist for this site, so if this sounds like something you’d be interested in checking out, definitely do so.

If you were into Seafarer Fables before, well he’s ba-ack! Go check it out. GO!