Whyte Horses - Pop Or Not (CRC)

That Manchester group Whyte Horses are masterminded by Dom Thomas, a "chronologist who scours the planet for obscure and rare vinyl genius" and makes and sells far-out mixes of his far-flung findings, designed to feel like "looking at a sun drenched mountain range through kaleidoscopic glasses", might give you some idea of what to expect from their debut LP. The titles of two instrumental tracks - "The Other Half of the Sky" and "The Dream Before" - provide further clues. When Pop or Not's opening and title track - another instrumental - gives way to a candyfloss-light drift, and singer Julie Margat coos "we are clouds passing by, wandering the sky", you'd be forgiven for snarkily remarking "well, like, OF COURSE you are, duuudes".

This is a midsummer day's dream of a record. "Promise I Do" and "Astrologie Siderale" bring wonderful memories (sugar)rushing back to me of my first year of uni, of falling hurriedly in love with the first Concretes album. Jim Noir's Tower of Love is a colourful pop confection of a similar vintage, and it figures that he pops up here (check the Noirish toy-town piano on "Wedding Song") given that the Horses hail from near his "patch". Indeed, for all the talk of travelling the world in search of Brazilian tropicalia and Turkish psych (it takes many hours of studying Gallic girl-group pop to sound as cool and carefree as Whyte Horses do on "La Couleur Originelle" and "Peach Tree Street"), this is a very Manchester record. Jez Williams of Doves contributes, while it's impossible to liberally use shimmering backwards guitar - as on "She Owns The World" - without evoking the Stone Roses' "Don't Stop".

A decidedly Northern melancholy lurks in amongst the buttercup cups and daffodil teapots too: there's a sense of yearning and sadness in "When I Was A Scout"'s vocal and thrumming analogue synth; confusion and disorientation in "Feels Like Something's Changing"; the second track tellingly isn't called "Little Fluffy Clouds", it's called "The Snowfalls".

Whyte Horses have created something both instant and involving, weightless and heavy. It's pop...and, yet, it's not.