Piano Magic open their 12th record with the epic title track "Closure," thus making it immediately clear they don't intend to avoid the fact that it will be their last. In contrast to the earlier track "No Closure" from their grim yet beautiful WWI concept album
Artists Rifles, they seem determined to close the door firmly on this 20-year-old post-rock collective. Founding member
Glen Johnson exploits his weary croon to great effect as he sings the lines "Let's get this thing sewn up/Let's get this thing signed off/Let's tie up these loose ends," resolute in his efforts to achieve some sort of catharsis. It requires acknowledgment of some of the less fortunate aspects of
Piano Magic's history, which has seen them largely ignored by their native country: "All these people open wounds/The English always too polite/To say what really must be said/They'd rather take it to their death." But try as they might, they have to concede "You never get/No you never get closure." The rolling bassline, distorted guitar, barely-there electronics, and backing vocals that mirror a monk-like chant add up to a languid and elegant start that refuses to be rushed. But then
Piano Magic have never played the game. Despite a string of well-received records and collaborations with such venerable artists as
John Grant and
Vashti Bunyan, they've always appeared to almost willfully fail to capitalize on their successes due to an ostensibly reticent approach, and their penchant for restless genre-hopping. Taciturn tendencies aside, this is in many respects their most direct collection acknowledging their history and their imminent demise. "Landline" quickens the pace a little, only to lament "You used to call me on my landline/You used to leave your voice behind," just as the music will survive the band. It just avoids being too maudlin in the sense that the theme is approached wryly, unlike some
Piano Magic recordings that can feel incredibly earnest. On this record they've certainly gone for a more lo-fi sound than the bombastic approach of
Disaffected and
Ovations -- as on the post-rock drifting guitar lines of "Let Me Introduce You" and "Exile"'s moody groove, which recalls slowcore purveyors
Low. In contrast, on "You Never Stop Loving (The One That You Loved),"
Johnson's voice feels at its least weary -- even light -- making it the prettiest track on the record. They end with the inherently emotional "I Left You Twice, Not Once," which at one moment claims "I could not bear to say goodbye," only to blithely confess "Never even noticed/Never cared." Revisiting their back catalog is to realize they were never inscrutable. Even the experimental electronica of their debut,
Popular Mechanics, feels like it would fit more happily into the current musical climate than perhaps 1997 would have allowed; such are the benefits of increasingly blurred genre lines. This record works as an apt elegy to the band, and despite never again managing to reach the high-water mark
Piano Magic achieved with
Low Birth Weight,
Closure remains a fine final flourish.