Album Review: Snakadaktal - Sleep In The Water

How exactly do you define dream-pop? And what on earth is a Snakadaktal? Following on from their eponymous non-genre-specific EP, many people found themselves asking these very questions. Everyone knew that the teen quintet from Melbourne was good, but what exactly were they? Sleep In The Water, their 13-track debut LP provides the answer. There's definitely a more defined sound, a consistency of lo-fi pop and not-quite-dance beats, resulting in a distinctive record from triple j's 2011 Unearthed High winners.

Opening track, Fall Underneath, will have you clapping your hands and thinking of The xx, and Hung On Tight, the first single of the record, draws Temper Trap comparisons. There's an obvious emphasis on album structure and the latter parts of the LP display a willingness to delve beyond the comfort of their more melodic and crowd-pleasing past hits Air and Chimera.

Ghost, with its almost whisper-soft vocals, has a fittingly ethereal feel. Union gives you a glimpse of what vocalist Phoebe Cockburn is capable of and Sleep, with its trickling crescendo, is the most powerful song on the album.

Three-part track The Sun is a bit of a mystery, initially written and performed for the band by vocalist Sean Heathcliff as a 15-minute ballad. It still works, but perhaps it would've been better as a single track?

Sleep In The Water might be a debut LP, but this band of recent high school graduates shows they've come a long way since thinking up their name in a year ten maths class. There's still room for growth of course - perhaps a little less synthesiser and a little more variation in lyrics - but one thing is certain: Snakadaktal have shed their skin, and this is only the beginning.