There's a moment on Piano Magic's excellent The Troubled Sleep
of... album from 2003 where singer Angèle David-Guillou sighs,
"You turn on your side, like you have to face north/ Or else you
can't sleep: The unwritten law." It feels important, this
moment, to the extent that any pinpoint coalescence of a new
phase in a random indie band's musical development can be. Where
before one sensed that for Piano Magic the song was simply a
framework notion in which other, perhaps more interesting things
could be achieved, on the gentle "The Unwritten Law" it's like
the two levels, sound and song, merged and became
indistinguishable: For better or worse, Piano Magic were now
songwriters, rock performers.  And yet, even though it was done
with a typically measured grace, Piano Magic's transformation
from their original status as Glen Johnson's revolving-door
avant-indie "project" into a full-fledged rock band still
surprises, and perplexes a bit, four years on. Perhaps it's
simply that, whatever story it was that earli