Fink
Perfect Darkness
Release Date: Jul 19, 2011
Genre(s): Electronic, Pop/Rock
Record label: Ninja Tune
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Album Review: Perfect Darkness by Fink
Great, Based on 5 Critics
Based on rating 4/5
Fin "Fink" Greenall is an atypical singer-songwriter, inasmuch as he DJed for the dance label Ninja Tune in a previous life before radically changing direction in 2006. Since then, he and his self-titled band have crafted softly-spoken acoustica that makes a feature of his lulling voice – it's in the same beguiling ballpark as Jose Gonzales and John Legend – and contemplative guitar/drum/string arrangements. His fourth album often achieves such loveliness you don't want it to end.
Based on rating 7/10
Often the best things are said to be “more than the sum of their parts”, but sometimes the numbers don’t appear to add up at all. That a DJ and producer for London-based independent electro label Ninja Tune should have a subsequent career as the core of an acoustic trio, for example, seems quite a stretch. That such a man should have had collaborations with the likes of American R&B star John Legend and British rapper Professor Green sounds more improbable still.
Based on rating 7/10
On Perfect Darkness, Fink sticks to the excellent template he developed around 2006, and in its best moments, the record offers sounds on par with anything off his previous two records: the same taut folky guitar, the same delicate grooves, and the same quiet, reserved vocals all rolled into one laconic, low-key package. It's not really as dark as he says, but instead, it's perfect introspection music, sort of like Early Day Miners covering Recoil's bluesy electronica gem, or SubHuman, only using even fewer notes than usual, with two or three sparse textures at most, other than the vocals. Therein lies the problem, though, as deeper into the album, Fink tries to take brevity to new heights and limits the instrumentation to his guitar and nothing else.
Opinion: Excellent
A slow-burning potential classic from the Brighton-based songwriter. Ian Wade 2011 Fink is the showbiz pseudonym of singer songwriter Fin Greenall. Since 2000 he’s been operating as Ninja Tune’s one guitar-wielding troubadour in their catalogue, and has gone on to work with Nitin Sawhney, Lamb and Zero 7. And that’s not all: he had that John Legend fellow guest on his last album, has co-written material beside Amy Winehouse and Bonobo (among others), and most recently popped up on Professor Green’s Alive Till I’m Dead; he’s also helping out on the rapper’s next album.
Opinion: Fairly Good
British singer-songwriter Fin Greenall, under the name Fink, has crafted a mellow acoustic-driven album of mostly traditional, mostly dark songs in Perfect Darkness. Primarily using a finger-picked acoustic guitar, played with a high amount of technique, Fink augments his soulful voice with a tasteful bit of reverb and a bit of bass, occasionally adding a full band for a little atmosphere. Aside from that, this is an album about Fink, his guitar and his songs.