“Shouter/songwriter with a Scottish accent” is how London-based Neev self-identifies, yet there’s so much more on offer than that. For over half a decade Neev has been making the world a better place by unleashing sublime sounds that act as a balm soothing increasingly troubled times. Latest album, How Things Tie In Knots, is something of the Gordian kind and features ten enigmatic tracks you’ll spend countless fun-filled hours trying to unravel.

Neev is the type of artist who avoids easy categorisation (that’s another riddle to unpick), but if there’s one thing that unites these ten cuts (and, indeed, the whole discography) then it’s a certain ethereal quality. It’s not quite shoegaze, yet it has a dreamlike quality that only exists in that magical fug somewhere betwixt wake and sleep. Case in point being the album’s first track ‘Dianne’, while most artists would arrive with speaker-popping fanfare, Neev takes a more indirect approach and slips one under the net with an introduction that appears as if an apparition at the edge of your periphery. That doesn’t make it any less powerful, if anything its understated guitar motif and insanely catchy melody only serve to ingratiate themselves into your psyche. Its otherworldly vibe means that layers of sound are added, almost imperceptibly, and before we realise it we are totally subsumed in Neev’s sound. With a ghostly piece of music connecting the first two tracks, the second of which, ‘I Put It In A Frame’ is not unlike stepping through a wormhole leading another dimension. In fact, think of this album as Mr. Benn (younger readers might need to Google that) faced with a series of doors with each leading to a song with unique character and identity, trying on different shades and textiles.

Those familiar with the Scottish brogue will be familiar with its rhythmic quality and that’s something Neev has brought to this release. Those unaccustomed to the argot, however, might require a few spins to fully decipher the lyrics, yet their very ambiguity adds to that feeling of sleep and half-forgotten worlds. Therefore, it’d be easy to draw lazy comparisons with the Cocteau Twins’ Elizabeth Fraser and The Sundays’ Harriet Wheeler, and while they are convenient points of reference, Neev definitely has a unique thing going on. Take the aforementioned ‘Frame’ for example, the vocals become an instrument, dancing and pirouetting like a ballerina and entwining your cranium with their wonderful elasticity whilst ‘My Own Back’ is a piece of cabaret from some strange nocturnal world. Yet, How Things Tie In Knots is certainly not made for somnambulists and the following ‘An Unspeakable Thing’ has the type of riff that could wake even the most ardent narcoleptic with a sudden stop that makes it all the more a rude awakening.

Like the sweetest of dreams, How Things Tie In Knots will haunt you long after the disc has stopped spinning and simply demands that you hit ‘play’ again.

• How Things Tie In Knots is released via Trapped Animal Records on 28th March 2025 (available here).
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Track List:

1. Dianne
2. I Put It In A Frame
3. Stubborn Heads
4. He Built Himself
5. Keep Low
6. There’s Two
7. My Own Back
8. An Unspeakable Thing
9. A Sad Tightrope
10. Two Equals