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Reviews Review translated courtesy of Hans Hneufeld. Getting noticed big time has unfortunately been denied this band so far. There were however a few smaller successes for the band while supporting more established acts. After gaining an awareness amongst the audiences through well delivered pieces from their repertoire, and receiving good responses, they soon fell into oblivion and were forgotten by their former fans. We think it was because Greenhaus had not made it easy for their fans to create a lasting impression. Other bands managed to play themselves into the hearts of their fans. Greenhaus’ problem was that the band was quite unknown and a great let down was their musical diversity and inconsistency. Greenhaus started with purely instrumental projects, highlighting spherical, technical sounds. Later a number of guest-vocalists extended the band’s repertoire, which in turn changed the sound of the band quite radically. Focused more on vocals, the pieces sounded much cooler in the direction of ‘Electro-Pop’ with tendencies to ‘Trip-Hop’. ‘You’re Not Alone’, as the latest album title states, is the first album of the band registered for the German market and the debut with singer Phoenix J, who has also accompanied the band on their latest gigs. She is the band’s sole lead singer for some time now and presents herself with the band for the first time on a full-length album. Arguably, that was what the band was lacking in the past... a voice that leads like a ‘red thread’ through the multi-facetted songs. It doesn’t even spoil the overall impression that the band features other guest-vocalists on some songs as they had done in the past. One remarkable difference is that these guest-vocalists are just that and don’t disturb the now much more homogeneous feel of the individual songs as a whole. There are moments full of simple beauty that last four minutes... that description comes to mind with the first line into the CD. This beauty is presented by the title track of the album. This song was already a secret winner and a nominee to be the strongest song on their new album when the band played it while on tour as the opening act for DE/VISION. In the beginning it was more of a sub-conscious feeling that established itself very soon after. Why the song is the very first track on the album puzzles me, though. This so opulently arranged ‘Electro-Pop’ opener, with it’s heartbreakingly beautiful melody, which ends in a tirade of strings, would have had a much better place in the last part of the album, but that doesn’t mean that the following songs are of lesser importance and quality. From the moment of enlightening (‘You’re Not Alone’) to a longing melancholy (‘Home’), Greenhaus always creates a fresh moment of musical beauty anew. Phoenix J is the listener’s guide, who paints the songs with warm and comfortable colours. The petite Singer with her slightly fragile voice appears solid and sure-footed though throughout all the tracks, be it the ‘Trip-Hop’ ‘Bird Of Passage’, with its lightly electronica inspired sound, or the more rock sound of ‘Higher Ground’. Greenhaus manages to build a steady rhythm, lead predominantly by drums, or bridges long passages simply with the sound of the guitar. Greenhaus, who managed to enlighten me already with their live performances last year, have done it again this year to brighten up the late Fall with a beam of sunshine, similar to Sigur Ros, who managed to do this just two months earlier. Read the Electric Diary english interview here.
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