Info:

Album Reviews:

Eclipsed Magazine (Germany)

Vito. A reckoning of sorts. (8.03)
Album: Make Good Areas Disturbed. (2006)
Label/Sales: Flower Shop/Rough Trade
www.vitomusic.co.uk

Vito’s speciality are walls of sound. Just like bands such as Mogwai, Godspeed You Black Emporer! and Sigur Ros. However, this Welsh quiet’n’loud band carries enough own potential to be unmistakeable. “A Reckoning Of Sorts”, with its threatening quiet before the storm (which in the end does really arrive), is a blueprint for the typical Vito sound.

Intro Magazine (Germany)

Vito. Sophias Freunde. (Sophia’s friends)
When I met Vito they were just on tour as backing band for their mentor and head of their label, Robin Proper-Sheperd (aka Sophia). Their eyes and words tell of pure euphoria, the kind of mood you develop when you’re living a dream that you never thought would come true. For years, the various members had been idling in different bands all over Cardiff without anything significant happening. Up until 15 years ago no A&R (?) ever made it to Wales. Then the Manic Street Preachers happened, and other bands, too, got recording contracts, without Vito profiting. So they simply recorded their first album – Make Good Areas Disturbed – and their producer, Charlie Francis, proved to be a marketing genius. This is because he knew Proper-Sheperd, who he showed the recordings. Vito got a deal with Flowershop Recordings, and now they are touring the whole of Europe. They never thought this would happen, especially since their music is anything but popular in their home country. “What counts in the UK is first and foremost fashion, then music. And since we’re not interested in fashion we don’t have much luck at home.” Their music, which is reminiscent of Mogwai and Sigur Ros, does not fit well colourful ties and crooked haircuts. Therefore they see their opportunities mainly on the other side of the Canal: “Our friends from McLusky have always told us about the reception they got on the continent. And indeed, during our current tour we have received more positive feedback than ever before in GB.”
Christian Steinbrink
Translation: Christian Baars 2006

Visions Magazine 1 of 2 (Germany)

The album which Reinhold Messner (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner) doesn’t listen to without an oxygen mask: epical mountaineering music for people with stamina. In football, actual playing time rarely exceeds 65 minutes. And even most post rock albums do not last that long, especially considering how much time is being wasted on sleepwalking interludes, guitar feedbacks and other moody hullaballoo. This, however, is good and correct: just like the football player needs the time it takes to kick corners and take throw-ins for catching his breath, post rock requires peace to allow the storm to rage properly. The most recent example of our reasoning: the Welsh band Vito and their debut album “Make good areas disturbed”, which represents a search for a meaningful balance between quiet and blustering. Here is being invested much time in the preparation of a proper spring clean – lulling for several minutes, until the drumsticks turn into batons and the guitars to pressure washers. Nevertheless, this album will never sound as if it was copied from the great book of applied mogwai-music. It has many peculiarities, lives of sensitive, concerted vocals and may even stray into cheesy Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals – as long as there are no marches on the menu. A twinkle in the eye of the storm.

Eclipsed Magazing Review (Germany)

New Artrock
Vito
“Make Good Areas Disturbed”
(Flower Shop/Rough Trade)

“All you have to do is listen…” announces a pleasant voice right at the beginning of “Make Good Areas Disturbed”, and we can’t help but immediately follow this well-meaning advice. This is despite the fact that initially we are not sure what to expect from Vito’s debut album. But seconds later, a calming guitar lick and harmonic singing guide us on the direct path to the high voltage art rock of this group from Cardiff. The five band members rise into an eruptive noise feedback, already hinted at by the slow build up of the ?susperse which lifts the opening song “Ultimate Shame” to the first highlight of the album. And this is only the first impression of “Make Good Areas Disturbed”. The band manages seemingly effortlessly to raise the stakes song by song, until the expectations, raised illimitably, eventually trigger pure amazement. Light, nimble-footed bells lead up to the predictably spirited outburst of the following track “Falling Out” and the hard to beat “Arrested By These Phenomena”. In the truest sense of the word the effects are being drummed home and reach a climax that can be compared, without any sense of guilt, with those of Mogwai (noise factor), Sigur Ros (charm) and Godspeed You Black Emperor! (progressiveness). And while during the chanting of the ballad-like “Rejoice” the ?neoprog is highly priced, Vito appear to have all the time in the world with “Washaway”, to eventually arrive where the band has been aiming at throughout the whole album: the Elysium of general well-being, mastered confidently by the enormously harmonious track “Across The Rubicon”, and “A Reckoning Of Sorts” (watch out here, just like with all other songs, for the effective closing sequence). “All you have to do is listen…?” Vito don’t have to ask twice!
CA
Translation: Christian Baars 2006

Visions Magazing Interview (Germany)

Lieber Sandburgen treten: We rather kick sand castles
Vito like dance and party music. As long as they don’t have to make it themselves.
You don’t have to understand everything musicians say and do. But it should be allowed to ask what’s going on when a band doesn’t want to tell their name, and their lead singer hides behind a pseudonym. “We are five individuals which, combined, form the character of Vito”, tries to explain the man who plainly wants to be called Ash. “The requirements of the individual do not count. It’s just like Led Zeppelin. They were four strong personalities, but only interesting as a unity.” A good point, although one should not be misguided by this: musically, Welsh Vito could hardly be further from Page, Plant and Co., as they demonstrate with their debut album “Make Good Areas Disturbed”. The disc is a tensile test for people who otherwise let their patience be challenged only by Sigur Ros or Godspeed You! Black Emperor. Richly orchestrated with wind players, fiddlers and bells, constantly torn between dim peacefulness and theatrically stirred up thunder and lightning. “Like all things, our music is of temporary nature,” ponders Ash. “We create it, but we also destroy it again. Principally, we are just like little kids, building a sand castle only to stomp on it afterwards.” Even during this comparison Ash can’t move himself to produce a smile, emphasises, however, that his band is not a bunch of eternal misery guts: “We like women and football, drinking beer and dancing to Franz Ferdinand. We also have a sensitive side, which we express through our music. This helps us to loose our fear of emotions such as grief or depression. We embrace our melancholy, we celebrate it.”
Daniel Gerhardt
Translation: Christian Baars 2006

Reviews of the 7" single:

piccadillyrecords.com

Vito - Never Been Careful/My Tornado Is Resting 7" single.

Very limited, hand-stamped, stickered and individually numbered 7". Described as instrumentals with vocals (eh??) but once heard you will gain enlightenment. Comparable with Low, a Sigur Ros influenced Angelo Badalamenti and Explosions In The Sky these cats whip up an intelligence noise frenzy and are also responsible for an amazingly dynamic live show.

Bloom.de - an online magazine.

We begin the New Year straight away with a genuine hit: "Never Been Careful" by Vito begins so quietly, almost contemplatively, as one wishes for from a song in January - only to tirn on the power towards the end. Of course we are familiar with this from the usual suspects like Mogwai or Sigur Ros, but with Vito there are also people who can sing. It's a pity that the 7" inch is limited to 1000 copies.

smallfish.net

One of the 2 new 7 inches from Robin Proper-Sheppard (aka Sophia) and his flower shop label, their first new releases in years. Fans of Marks Eitzel and Kozelek, not to mention Sophia themselves will probably go for this (again) surprisingly (almost) mainstream sounding US indie rock. Mind you, there's a pretty epic shoegazery bit towards the end that might scare off the Coldplay fans!