91Èȱ¬

You shiver- it was a bad idea to come up here, you knew it at the time; aside from the fact heights give you the collywobbles it's just not the moment to be hanging around on a rooftop in the pitch black.

You realise that you've been holding your breath. Adrenaline is coursing through your veins but you feel strangely calm, like whatever happens you'll accept it as a result of your decision to come to the roof tonight. Far below, a door bangs open and raucous noise explodes from it, men singing, drunk, disappearing into the smothering fog of the city but leaving the door ajar, letting spanish guitars float up to you. Mournful, pretty; at odds with the hiss and roar of the pipes behind you, seething liquid boiling and cooling.

You become aware of soft footsteps on the rooftop with you, staggering a little, as though the perpetrator is having difficulty walking - drunk, you think, without turning around; you know you're hidden here behind the outlet. A soft panting accompanies the footsteps, out of breath from the stairs no doubt. A crash says the person creating the noise has tripped into something and is probably now sitting wondering when the world is going to get the right way up again. You vaguely entertain the idea of going and checking on them but decide it's not worth the risk unless you can get a look at them first without revealing your presence.

The wind's starting to die, moonbeams speckling the industrial maze around you as the clouds pass and yet a sudden chill runs up your spine and you fight to stay still enough to know you're hidden as your rooftop companion begins to... sing?

One of the men from the spanish restaurant, you decide. It would make sense, this building's only just across from it and the stairwell's always open, maybe he thought he could clear his head up here. Yet the singing is a muttered whisper, gently breathed so softly you have to almost strain your ears to hear past a sudden jet of steam. The words send more chills up your spine; sounding almost wounded, the singer seems to be talking to someone who's not there - a wronged lover, perhaps - but the mention of demons makes you curl back into the pipes a little more, uncomfortably clammy though they are.

You nearly fall right back into the pipes when suddenly, almost as if on cue the moon comes fully from behind the clouds and the singer opens their throat, howling suddenly, almost baying at the night, the sudden normality of their words surprising you just as much as the change in volume- maybe you were right but baby I was lonely; I don't wanna fight, I'm tired of being sorry

Leaves swirl, apparently appearing from the concrete of the rooftop's "floor" for all the flora or fauna in the vicinity and you huddle back, listening to the singer mutter once more, desperate and earnest, yet seeming to be in the wrong somehow. Unnerved, you wonder if you can make it to the stairs without them realising, although in a way you'd like to hear the rest of their song but as they invoke vampires, you wonder if they might not just be mad, dangerous even. There's something romantic about it, though, with the guitars from below still playing a mournful song and the thud of the city (or is that your heart?) filling your ears. Spellbound, you wait, barely breathing and weak at the knees from ...something, fear you suppose.

As the singer, raw-throated and clearly tired, howls his remorse once more, the wind picks up again, so strong you're afraid you might be blown from the rooftop, plunging you back into darkness and all goes quiet under the howl of the sudden gale.

When you open your eyes again, the wind dying as quickly as it rose, you realise you're alone on the rooftop again. Running out, suddenly reckless, you check the sides to make sure the singer took the stairs, rather than being blown by the sudden gust - much as they unnerved you, you wouldn't want to see them plunge to their death, since they seemed quite harmless really.

Seeing nothing, you feel an urge to wait once more. Trusting the instinct, you stand still, ears pricked until the spanish guitar starts up once more, quieter, as though it's somehow got far more distant in the ten metres across the roof. Far below, something howls - long, low and so sad you feel your eyes sting for a moment, surely just a sudden burst of steam screaming out of one of the pipes.

This is absolutely the last time you spend an evening you're meant to be writing a review on sitting about on the roof, you think, as you clamber back down the stairs, peeling off layers of clothing unnecessary to the indoors. You'll stop shivering when you get these damp things off, surely...

Download: Out now
CD Released: September 24th

(Hazel Robinson)