Kyte are a band from Leicestershire, my home county, and a band I have been following for a year or so now. After a pretty successful mini-album (in the arsty music sphere at least) they are releasing a new EP, often a tricky job.

Despite having kept both an ear and an eye on them in recent times the opening track is a little surprising. ‘Eyes Lose Their Fire’ is a perfect autumnal song. Filled with a wistful happiness, the vocals are whispered as if they were freezing on a cold November air, while musically it evokes images of curling up by a roaring fire with those you hold dear and a hot drink. It’s got a very Sigur Rós feel to it. Thoroughly delightful but not the familiar Kyte.

Second track, ‘Bridges In The Sky’, returns to the Kyte I recognise, electronic twiddles and IDM glichiness creating a broad soundscape, and the remaining couple of tracks on the EP follow suit.

The third number is a cover of Peter Gabriel’s ‘Solsbury Hill’, clocking in just shy of six minutes. The bleeps and tings sound like electronic icicles. An interesting take an old classic, the vocals delivered in a hush voice making it quite a chilling experience.

The final song, ‘Lights Outside Here’ is reminiscent of Plaid’s more accessible, laid back material from the ‘Rest Proof Clockwork’ and ‘Spokes’ albums. There’s lots of little bleeps, pops, dings and clicks going back and forth with a hint of Imogen Heap about the vocals. It is the best track on EP, morphing from gentle dripping of electronica into a more traditional sounding post-rock piece with the introduction of drums, and then again in to a piece with a distinct dance edge a la 65daysofstatic before it fades away, feeling much shorter than the 10 minutes it really lasts.

Such is the quality of the last track that you begin to forget the concerns you had over the EP up to this point but it is a little disappointing that nothing grand ever really materialises, but then for a post-rock/ambient type outfit the loud-quiet dynamic is often overused and all too predictable so it’s interesting to hear a quiet-quiet take on it.

‘Two Sparks, Two Stars’ is nothing ground-breaking but by no stretch of the imagination is it a bad record. In fact it’s really rather good. A collection of widely accessible, soothing tracks, it’s just a shame it feels like it’s all been done before by the Radioheads, Thrices and Plaids of this world. It shows a great deal of promise of quality future releases from the Midland chaps however.