Tvål – Tvål

There’s a special kind of thrill when a band rips up its own blueprint. Tvål didn’t just leave Thee Telepaths behind. They torched the fuzz pedals, rewired the vision and turned a spontaneous gear purchase into a whole new vocabulary.

Back when they were Thee Telepaths, Dean Cumming and Thomas J. Wright dealt in the language of volume. Fuzz pedals, psych jams that sprawled and spiralled until they felt ready to topple. The band made three EPs and an LP that buzzed with brute force and hypnotic repetition. It was loud, raw and made to overwhelm.

Then came the split, the pub in Northampton and that impulse decision to buy an old Roland drum machine. No big manifesto. Just curiosity and a couple of pints behind them. That one decision shifted everything. Out went the fuzzed-up guitars, in came vintage synths, samplers and drum machines linked up by midi cables. They swapped brute force for pulse and texture, drawing on kosmische’s shimmering patience and the mechanical elegance of early electronic pioneers. This wasn’t nostalgia for its own sake. The new sound feels handmade, slightly rough at the edges, alive. You can still trace the spirit of Thee Telepaths in the repetition and the drive, but Tvål push it somewhere cooler, stranger and far more spacious. Two years in a self-built studio in Kettering turned that first experiment into Tvål. A record that pays tribute to Harmonia and Moroder while sneaking in breaks that nod to Mo’Wax and samples that feel lifted from dusty library archives. Let’s drop the needle and see where it takes us.

 The opener ‘Vanishing Point’ is all poise. Slowly building on a low throb and fluttering synths, it feels like cruising through some deserted B-road version of the Autobahn at night. The textures crackle. The rhythms lock into place and we are away. It’s a cinematic start, and it tells you early on: this is not about hooks, it’s about momentum.

Up next ‘Circles’ is a more tightly wound proposition. The track’s motorik kick and interlocking layers call back to Harmonia’s leaner moments, but there’s something sneakier underneath. A warped sample maybe, or a buried drum fill that sounds like it was lifted from a forgotten library tape. There’s an undercurrent of tension, like the song might fall apart if you blink. It never does but the tension keeps you on point.

‘Barefoot In The Dark’ where things start to loosen up. It feels like a jam session between a Mo’Wax-era beatmaker and a Berlin school dropout. Dusty drum machine patterns walk side by side with synth lines that feel improvised and intuitive. The rhythm of the lead synth line brings to mind a morse code signal. Like they’re letting the machines talk among themselves. I love how they have bedded the vocals deep in the mix, as if they were an afterthought of the technology.

The next track is titled ‘Jazz’ but its anything but. A lurching bass motif loops over jittery percussion and cascading synth lines. There is tons of space in the mix. It isn’t chasing melody or drama. Instead, it feels like two musicians gently coaxing textures out of old machines and seeing what sticks. The result is completely captivating. You lean in, waiting to see what tiny detail they’ll introduce next. A new note. A faint echo. A cosmic flutter.

Moving into ‘The Garden’ the bpm’s drop considerably creating a contemplative feel. Built around slow, deliberate synth lines and a gently ticking beat, ‘The Garden’ leaves room for the mood to settle in. The vocoder vocals drift across the mix, sounding both distant and deeply human. There’s a solemn edge here too. A hint of gothic melancholy beneath the surface that keeps it from becoming too serene. Everything feels measured. Nothing rushes. It’s the sound of reflection rather than reaction.

That slow, unhurried beat circles beneath drifting synth fragments, holding the next track together without ever pushing it forward too quickly. The pace stays settled, almost stubbornly so, giving each texture time to breathe. Hints of vintage breaks float by, more suggested than fully stated. The mood stays restrained, never boiling over into full groove. It feels like an ode built from patience. Space and silence carry as much weight as the sounds themselves. By the end, ‘Klaus Weiss’ leaves an impression of quiet respect rather than loud tribute. Well done lads, a thoughtful nod to the spirit of those old library records that lets atmosphere do the talking.

With ‘Black Notes’ the pulse kicks back in. Driven by a crisp hi hat rhythm, this feels more urgent than what came before. The synth piano riff keeps things anchored while squelchy stabs flicker across the mix, adding flashes of tension. A ghostly vocal floats just behind it all, half-buried but still there, giving the track an unsettled, spectral feel. The contrast between the smooth piano line and the jagged synth hits keeps it interesting, a push and pull that never fully resolves but keeps you locked in until the end.

The album closes out with the expansive ‘Broken Frames’. Mid-tempo and steady, it drifts between lighter, almost fragile vocal lines and the weightier rumble of deeper synth tones. That contrast gives it a gentle tension, as if the track can’t decide between warmth and gloom. What surprised me the most was that it conjures the mood of a lost Cure track. Y’know kinda understated, slightly melancholy but quietly hopeful around the edges. The beat keeps things moving along without hurrying. Nothing feels rushed. The song lets its textures shimmer and fade. By the close, it leaves you somewhere between comfort and unease which for me is a fitting end to a record built on contrasts and quiet surprises.

Tvål are doing things their own way. No computers. No presets. No plan beyond letting the gear guide the song. What’s so thrilling though is how complete it feels while still being totally loose. The edges are frayed, the sounds are imperfect, and that’s exactly what gives it its shape. Whilst the influences are there if you go looking (Moroder, Cluster, early Depeche Mode) trust me, this is no pastiche. This is music made in the moment, by two people who clearly enjoy the process as much as the result. And it sounds brilliant. Do yourself a favour. Let the machines hum in your ears for a while because Tvål are onto something.

Tvål Out now via Cracked Plastic and you can check em out now over on their Bandcamp Page. A second pressing of the album is due to drop very soon, with gigs in Northampton, Norwich and London to follow. The follow up LP is under construction now for release early in 2026, hopefully preceded by an EP of extended mixes of 2-3 tracks from the new LP.

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Photo Credit

Jo Selby-Green