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ELLE TEA
The Past From Which I Ran

Self-released (2024)
Rating: 8.5/10

Only a short while ago I was telling you about the latest EP from the intriguing Italian act Elle Tea, who blew me away last year with the Fate Is At My Side debut album. Admittedly, the recent EP Pain And Vengeance threw me a bit with some of it’s less than “rock” dynamics, but it also kept me intrigued with some of its nuances, all courtesy of Leonardo Trevisan, the wizard behind the curtain. According to the press release, this album “…is the second chapter of a trilogy of albums recorded in continuity between 2017 and 2023. The third album will be published in 2025.”

With its striking cover art (also the creation of Trevisan), the album showcases the refreshing talent of a man whose stunning and breezy compositions must surely start to attract bigger audiences. There’s an obvious passion here for 70s and early 80s rock, but what you also get are flecks of blues, hints of New Wave and enough dreaminess to send you off to mystical horizons.

You can pick any track here and you’ll just sit in awe at the smooth and sublime innovation contained within, and yet for what seems to be such a simple expression you are never sure what is coming next. The title track begins proceedings as a wistful 70s light rocker that’s wonderfully familiar, even though you can’t put your finger on the influence. Somehow I imagine Trevisan surrounded by a vast library of old, yellowing fantasy books and obscure 70s rock albums, all of which are melted together in his mind and coughed up to result in his spellbinding music.

The chords constructed are the epitome of cool, conjuring spirits of yesteryear as wafts of Blue Öyster Cult merge with the brisk and summery pastures of Wytch Hazel, yet with more panache. Hear a song such as ‘Deep In Love’ and feel the rhythmic pulse of the foggy rock notions, but then get swept up in the cool mists of the semi-ballad ‘In Memories I Roam’ which has a contemporary pop vibe. ‘Runaway Heart’ evokes similar pleasures, hints of warm summer days but not a world away from, say, Bryan Adams.

It’s all such an intriguing brew where one moment there’s a sizzle of American AOR (‘Even If You Go’), the next a rustic New Wave Of British Heavy Metal vibe (‘No Saviour’), although the metal status is never fully confirmed due to the fragile veil which blankets the whole Elle Tea guise. The folky ‘Paper Sailed Ship’ ends the opus in the marrying of Genesis and Marillion as one pictures ancient shadows around Glastonbury in England as an audience of merry folk scurries by the light of bonfire flame.

Leonardo Trevisan has done it again, effortlessly striding through genres like a ghost, or a memory, enticing serenades not quite of steel but of retrospective flickers. Support Elle Tea by jogging over to the bandcamp page, and once purchased hop on to YouTube and become enchanted by the artwork which accompanies each track. Leonardo Trevisan is quite the craftsman and has produced another patchwork quilt of styles to mesmerize and tantalise.

Neil Arnold

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