Felix Riebl - Into TheRain

Mon 18th Jul, 2011 in Music Reviews

As well as celebrating the 10th anniversary of The Cat Empire’s first gig, 2011 also signifies the release of front-man Felix Riebl’s first solo album, Into the Rain

Believing that the simplest expressions and metaphors are often are the most fitting for human experiences, Riebl’s album is emotive and brimming with stories of love, loss and transforming personal relationships into shared experiences. As a blanket rule though, if you’re not a fan of personal or emotional indulgence, perhaps it’s safest to give this one a miss.

I Won’t Know You Anymore is delicate and tender, while Bones and We Go Out are more audacious, and capture the jazz and staginess that is so quintessentially Cat Empire. A hair-raising cover of Bruce Springsteen’s I’m on Fire transitions seamlessly from the heartbreaking Helen unquestionably a woman of significance for Riebl.

Riebl’s album carries a powerful symbolism too, beginning with a river ( Wide Open Rivers and ending with a shore My Shore, in the same vein as the old dust to ashes adage, about the circularity of life and love. And with My Shore’s lyrics claiming, “how I long to go home”, the sentimentality and personal emotion injected into Reibl’s album is confirmed.