Album Review: Toby Martin - Love’s Shadow

The first solo album from the singer of Australian indie mainstays Youth Group starts with a piano ballad that offers a lot more than the first sonic impressions deliver. With the plodding beat and string flourishes, it sets up the mood for the record instantly – it employs these elements throughout. It's catchy and melodic and Martin's voice has aged gracefully, plus there's a little more grit although he still sounds vulnerable and a little weepy. From the earliest Youth Group singles, he's always been a lyrically-focused songwriter, and Nylex Nights is a magnificent showcase of this. Presumably a snapshot of wandering around Richmond in Melbourne (where the Nylex sign shines) lines like “The streets are full of the ghosts of drinkers” paint a vivid picture.

Much like The Aerial Maps, Martin uses obvious and familiar places such as Moreton Bay and Surfers Paradise to assist his storytelling – the latter as the location for Postcard From Surfers uses objects like pre-mix cans, Breezers and hotel rooms painted in pastels to create an all too real imagery for the track which he delivers in a poetic drawl. Even references to other places like Tehran in The End Of The Affair or New York Misses You are mentioned from afar. He gets into some much deeper territory as well: Good Friday explores the atheist's jealousy of the religious who have a saviour to rely on, while Persian Eyes explores the confusion of depression in paradise. 

Love's Shadow is a proudly Australian album, void of nationalistic pride but reveling in the landscape and its people. It's also a very strong introduction to Toby Martin as a solo artist.