Ist Ist - The Art Of Lying

The Manchester-based quartet, consisting of vocalist/guitarist Adam Houghton, bassist Andy Keating, guitarist/keyboardist Mat Peters and drummer Joel Kay, had released their debut album “Architecture” and it properly excited this reviewer. With a synth layered dose of lively yet, vocally deep, indie-rock based post-punk, they captured the sounds of JOY DIVISION, EDITORS and WHITE LIES and I was hooked. In the year that's passed, having seen them perform in the Manchester Academy while socially distancing, and seeing them in the Louisiana, Bristol, in some tiny upstairs pub room, everything BUT socially distancing, it’s fair to say I am beyond excited for their sophomore album, “The Art Of Lying”...let’s check it out.

Ist Ist - Architecture

Since they are inevitable, let’s get the main Joy Division comparisons out of the way right at the start. Yes, Ist Ist are a post-punk band from Manchester;  Adam Houghton’s sonorous voice does indeed strongly resemble Ian Curtis’s; and  the stark darkness of much of the sound, coupled with the ability to switch to an equally fiery attack, has much in common with that of ‘Unknown Pleasures’. It can’t be denied that this is an album that has many echoes of Joy Division’s two studio albums, in both sound and style. But comparisons can also be a compliment; if I’m reminded of them, it’s not least because this sounds like the album they might have made if they had continued to pursue a rockier path than that of the increasingly electronica-oriented New Order. On this evidence, Ist Ist certainly have the ability and confidence to develop something even more their own in the future.

by Adrian Janes