Leading French magazine Télérama awards The Quiet Portraits full marks in its review of John Canning Yates’ new album

Translation:

Imbued with sound mists with spectral accents, this sumptuous pop album emerged from nothingness immerses us in a soated universe with quiet comfort.

TTTT = 4/4 

There are the albums we are told to wait for and those we look for with little hope of surprise. And then those who fall on us without warning.

For these discs, we will always keep a special tenderness. The Quiet Portraits stands out in this category, which plunges us into the uneasy comfort of an inner adventure. Where does this echo-draped voice come from, these sound mists from which the moaning of a pedal-steel stands out, a bell sound at the end. John Canning Yates was strong by manifesting himself in 2004 under the name of Ella Guru, with a single album hailed by critics who compared him to Lambchop. Then the unknown of Liverpool totally slipped into what spatio-temporal flaw, summarily evoked (“my wasted years have been so many”) in The Way I Remember It.

Yates…gives us the effect of a diver crossing the sound layers of an ocean of dreams and sensations, to bring back forgotten treasures.

François Gorin, Télérama

Very quickly, Yates, who shows a minimal public image of a closed teddy bear, gives us the effect of a diver crossing the sound layers of an ocean of dreams and sensations, to bring back forgotten treasures. He says he drew these spectral melodies from the early hours of the morning, when the silence of the house envelops the sleep of loved ones.

It’s time to whisper close to the ear: “You make me wanna die, you make me feel alive. Cousin of famous more or less tragic autarchics (Mark Linkous, Elliott Smith, Paddy McAloon), JCY also touches on the clear Simon & Garfunkel (Lie in a Different Time) or the meditations of the old sage Bill Fay but in an impulse bordering on the grandiose – Riches, top of the album, extended by the Dreams Forgotten final. As on the first day, this music emerged from nothingness awakens our ability to dazzle in the face of simple feelings that we thought were worn out, or lost.

– François Gorin