With their delicate instrumentation, extended arrangements and high-register vocalising, Augie March tread ever so closely to the line between heartfelt wistfulness and fey pretentiousness.  Throughout the course of the quartet's debut album Sunset Studies, that line is thankfully not crossed - although there is the occasional near-miss, as on the musical meringue Maroondah Reservoir, with its opening line ("To be a bee, a moth") and Glenn Richards' curious vocal phrasing in the mid-section of Here Comes The Night.  But overwhelmingly Sunset Studies - a highly ideosyncratic and at times difficult work - offers many rewards.  Eschewing most current rock and pop conventions, it is a document of an older Australian society, one in which simple pleasures and emotional attachments were reflected upon at a slower pace.  Hip this definitely is not.  Warm, endearing, engaging it is.  Producers Paul McKercher and Richard Pleasance have managed to envourage a variety of sounds and approaches from a band for whom the slow ballad is average pace and the majestic Tasman Awakens and album closer Owen's Lament are two of the most affecting pieces you'll hear.  A band to be taken seriously. Shepparton should be proud

- Shaun Carney

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