On their long-awaited debut album Morning Ritual, Birmingham GB four-piece Chartreuse — composed of members Hattie Wilson, Mike Wagstaff, Rory Wagstaff, and Perry Lovering — have found the light in the darkness, sifting through the ruins of an anxious age in order to find the hope in it. "There's a strange optimism in pulling all of your negative traits out, revising and reviewing them, and then putting them back, in order," says Mike Wagstaff, of the band's intricate, gorgeous songwriting.
Morning Ritual (released last fall via Communion) had been a long time coming, with Chartreuse honing their craft over the course of four well-received EPs and the standalone 2022 single "Satellites," a collaboration with Orlando Weeks. Having experimented with partly producing their previous EPs, Mike stepped up as sole producer on 2021's Is It Autumn Already? and continues in the role for Morning Ritual.
While the band have described themselves in the past as "ambient dark-pop", their sound borrows from and touches on everything from folk to electronica to jazz and rock, and finds its own creeping majesty in what comes out. The quartet draw together a sound that roughly orbits that languid, often carefree musicality of Lambchop, the shivering grandeur of Nick Cave, and occasionally the chest thumping, life-affirming unity of The National. Perhaps even akin to the whiskey-cool-croon of King Krule, or the darkly intimate tones of Ben Howard’s I Forget Where We Were. Close snapshots given space to breathe and room to manoeuvre.
The full-length Morning Ritual and its singles ("Never To Be Real," "Whippet," "All Seeing All The Time," "Switch It On, Switch It Off") have garnered praise from the likes of NME, DIY, Dork, The Line of Best Fit, MOJO, Uncut, Far Out Magazine, The Independent, The Most Radicalist, Clash, Rolling Stone FR, and Gigwise. The record additionally found editorial support on Spotify (Fresh Folk, The Other List, Deep Dark Indie, Melomania, pulp, etc), Apple Music (New in Indie, Indie Alternative, Peak Indie, New Music Daily, etc), and TIDAL (Indie: Rising, Rock: Rising). | 
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