Flying below the radar
The Montgolfier Brothers
Roger Quigley and (left) Mark Tranmer in The Montgolfier Brothers , 2009
THOUGH David Gilmour has no clear memory of hearing The Montgolfier Brothers for the first time, it isn’t hard to discern the qualities in their music that would have appealed to his sensibilities. On “Journey’s End”, taken from their 2005 album All My Bad Thoughts, Roger Quigley sings, “You can’t stop time, hard as you might try/We’re not here long, and then you’re gone” –sentiments echoed by many of Polly Samson’s lyrics for Luck And Strange. The outward reserve of Quigley’s vocals tempers apoetic worldview that mixes bathetic minutiae with the internal 3am discourses we manage to keep at bay the rest of the time. In another time and place, it would have been no great stretch to imagine them on the Harvest roster alongside the young Pink Floyd and other quintessentially British voices such as Kevin Ayers and Roy Harper –although the influence of early albums by Felt and fellow Mancunian Vini Reilly also extends over the Montgolfiers’ sonic tableau.