Silver Screen is a thrilling ride from start to finish.

The last person left alive on planet Earth had been roaming the deserted streets for weeks but could not find another living soul. Until finally, a noise came from over his shoulder. He turned to see a towering figure in a wide-brimmed hat emerge from behind a huge, mirrored billboard. 

“Who are you?” asked the man. 

“It matters not, who I am. You…are the Blue Spectre.” 

And with that was born the inspiration for Blue Spectre and their debut album Silver Screen - or at least that’s how it went down in the half-remembered dream of Dan Thompson, one of the band’s two guitarists. Apocalyptic apparitions aside, Blue Spectre are a Brighton-based five piece, riding the wave of neo-psyche surf-rock currently cresting over our shores. Comprising a twin attack of fender guitars, backed by bass, drums, synth and a treasure chest of pedals and FX boxes, what the band lack in the absence of a vocalist, they more than make up for in super-tight arrangements and a keen sense of narrative tension.  

While there is a distinctly ‘surfer’ vibe to some of the rapid-fire guitar picking and frenetic drumming found across the record, Silver Screen - as the name suggests - is a cinematic affair, incorporating visual influences from the golden age of Hollywood, classic Westerns, film noir and new-wave. In traditional surf-rock style, none of the tracks have lyrics, so these contextual touchpoints are what help drive the sense of a story being told - that and the band’s commitment to laying down a distinctly filmic vibe on each track.

It’s impossible to resist the urge with this kind of music, to see it as the soundtrack to an imaginary film. And like all good stories, the one told on Silver Screen unfolds over three separate acts. Act 1 kicks off slap bang in the middle of the action, as the album races into life with ‘Danuary’; a crackling New York Punk-rock riff is swiftly joined by an urgent bassline, before the pleasing wallop of an FX pedal being slammed to the floor floods the mix with noise, sending everything into a frenzy. It’s a mad car-chase of a track, that pauses only fleetingly to catch its breath.  

Next out the blocks is the kinetic jangly psyche of ‘Things Fall Apart’, with layered guitars and sparkles of synth doing anything but falling apart, instead dancing around one another like a flurry of autumn leaves caught in an updraft. The frantic pace is maintained through the more classically surf-esque ‘TOL’ and the punkier ‘Intolerance’, which has a darker paranoid edge to it (and is accompanied by a suitably eerie video).

The first segment of the album draws to a close with ‘Man of Glass’, a moody intermission in the vein of a classic horror film score, with crescendos of anguished cello serving as a release valve for all the built up tension of the preceding tracks. After this rather breathless start, the mid-portion of Silver Screen heads into more outré territory. ‘Haaf Soul’ is another upbeat psyche stormer; thundering tom-toms propel tortured squalls of guitar and surges of synth to create a rioutous melee, reminiscent of Hawkwind’s classic space rock. 

But it’s the obliquely named ‘Instrumental’, arriving at the apex of what would be act 2, which is the album’s standout track. The sound of organ keys over a shuffling drum beat evokes paisley shirts and the summer of love, before layered melancholy guitars pull the carefree psychedelia into a narcotic come-down in a way the Brian Jonestown Massacre do so well. The track then opens out into a synth breakdown - sounding for all the world like the Chemical Brothers in full-on psychedelic mode - creating a beautifully elevated vantage point, from which you wish the band would pause a little longer to take in the scenery. But no sooner has the mood been set, before it changes once again and we’re onto the next scene.

If one senses Blue Spectre work hard to keep things concise and not let each successive mood outstay its welcome, then it seems they’re also at pains not to let their influences get the better of them. Whether it’s the distinctive sound of Hank Marvin’s fender guitar in The Shadows, the raw proto-psychedelic rock of the 13th Floor Elevators, or the iconic surf guitar sound of Dick Dale, it would be easy for Blue Spectre to sound like a pure pastiche act. But by combining these classic influences with more recent additions (think the angular guitars and crisp synths of 80s new-wave), and never sacrificing a good tune in the name of vibe alone, they avoid this trap.

The closing chapter of Silver Screen is introduced with ‘Enchantment’, another intermission style track; the gently strummed guitar strings and brushed drums evoking the classic beach sound of 1960s California. If this was a heist movie, we’d see our hero reclining on a sunlounger in Honolulu, the waves lapping at his feet as he sips on a Pina Colada, blissfully unaware of the police helicopter rounding the next cove. However the movie ends, Silver Screen is a thrilling ride from start to finish. And an exciting debut from a band clearly enamoured with some the lesser celebrated sounds of vintage rock, and adept enough to shape them for their own spooky purposes. It matters not who I am…you are Blue Spectre.