Magnetic Skies - Fragments (2025) Hi-Res

Imagine you are wandering alone in the dark in a housing estate in Warsaw in the 80s. You are anxious and you have main character syndrome. You need a soundtrack. You strap into your DeLorean and you listen to ‘No End’, the opening track on Magnetic Skies’ second album Fragments. Your mood is complete.

Somewhat spookily, I was reminded of Krzysztof Kieślowski about a minute into said track, then I read that it was inspired by the great director. The album cover probably helped forge the connection – it features the top of a grey tower block, like a fragment of the setting of A Short Story About Love. ‘No End’ could also soundtrack a Terminator aftermath. It’s a cold wave Casualty theme.

The David Bowie-inspired ‘Place on Earth’ begins with a skulking, fuzzy bass and A-Ha-like keyboard flourishes, and the soaring chorus could be mistaken for Editors except that frontman Simon Kent refrains from Ian Curtis karaoke. ‘Back to Life’ has also been released as a single and, as I wrote in a previous review, is the sort of shimmering, neon banger that 80s revivalists The Midnight would be proud to call their own. Speaking of next track ‘Closing In’, Kent says, “There’s a sense of pressure, fear, and confrontation, personally and with society in general,” though it’s possible that he’s extrapolating a paranoid world view from one bad night in Portsmouth city centre. “Arm me with light now” is unlikely to deter or protect against night-spoiling rotters, but as a lyric in ‘Closing In’, it’s a chest-beating plea to the lord of the dance Himself, God, who is famously a fan of post-punk synth and everything else he invented (barring free will and diseases, presumably).

The bass on ‘Your Shadow’ is as prominent and as menacing as anything on a Killing Joke record, and the line ‘let it burn!’ is bellowed with the gusto of a divorcee destroying their former partner’s belongings in a skip. ‘Slow Motion’ counterintuitively gallops along, and everyone would believe you if you said it was by Simple Minds in 1985. The first 46 seconds of ‘Can You Feel The World?’ sound like Massive Attack at the bottom of the ocean. The aquatic trip hop is barged out of the way by Norwegian death metal guitar, and the track also manages to make icy synths and sitar look like the perennial musical bedfellows they never were. ‘The Light In You’ pairs more sub-zero synths with throbbing bass, which has a strong resemblance to ‘Radio Club’ from Mareux’s latest collection of darkwave bangers Nonstop Romance.

Everything’s not alright, but since when has pop music been known to adhere to the truth? Therefore, Magnetic Skies are entirely justified in their decision to write ‘Everything’s Alright’. Indeed, as band co-founder Jo Womar sings on the bridge: “This is where we take control.” Likewise, by describing ‘Fire Escape’ as funereal Depeche Mode keeping an eye on health and safety, I’m taking control – take that, God! Final track ‘She Calls Me On’ is inspired by Kieślowski’s The Double Life Of Veronique. Lenin Alegria’s splashy stadium drums and a descending and despondent piano line are just two reasons why the track is a gorgeous and potentially classic synthwave epic.

So, on that hopeful and hyperbolic note, I’m going to watch Back to the Future again. While we’re all waiting for hovering skateboards to finally glide into mass marketable view, I suggest you wear a pair of shades regardless of the lighting and grab hold of Fragments.