Music Reviews
Haunt The Upper Hallways
by The Declining Winter
Although Hood might be on a hiatus that shows no signs of ending soon, the band’s members have been keeping busy. Gareth S. Brown has released two albums on Misplaced Music. Christopher Adams released We Know About The Need under the Bracken monicker in 2007 and has since contributed to various compilations, remix projects, and soundtracks. And Chris’ brother Richard has just released Haunt The Upper Hallways, the latest release from his lo-fi/experimental/post-rock outfit The Declining Winter.
I realize there are a lot of slashes in the above description, but that’s because Richard’s sound is rather mercurial. His brother Chris may focus on the more electronic/hip-hop aspects of Hood’s sound via Bracken but Richard is basically exploring everything else.
Think of the long, pastoral moments from The Cycle of Days and Seasons and Rustic Houses, Forlorn Valleys injected with post-classical fragments from Rachels and Steve Reich as well as some small amounts of dub and folk—and then all of it filtered through the sort of autumnal, melancholy, overcast haze that Hood and the rest of their Nostalgist ilk are so inclined towards and you’re getting close.
I don’t mean that listening to Haunt The Upper Hallways does nothing more than conjure up the desire to hear a new honest to God Hood album. Well okay… maybe it does at first.
Hymn To The Immortal Wind
by Mono
Methinks that now’s not really the best time to be listening to Mono’s Hymn To The Immortal Wind, and yet, it also strikes me as the absolute perfect time.
The headlines are rife with news of worldwide economic collapse. The U.S. is, in many ways, more divided than ever, with some confident that we’re on the right path and others shouting from the rooftops that we’re heading towards some new dark age. New environmental concerns seem to appear every other day. Our culture is fixated on so much that is shallow, hollow, and false. Every time we seem to make strides against them, the twin hydras of terrorism and religious extremism lift up a few more ugly heads. And finally, if all of that weren’t bad enough, we’ve got pirates to deal with, too.
And then along comes Hymn To The Immortal Wind, the latest from the Japanese post-rock quartet, and it strikes me as a perfect soundtrack for the times. While listening to their apocalyptic sturm und drang, I find myself given to emotional outbursts as big as the band’s musical ones; I simultaneously want to cry at the sight of the dark territories their music traverses even as I am buoyed up by, and rallying to, the climactic moments when their music rails against the darkness.
Brush Away The Cobwebs
by Ronald Of Orange
For the last 15 years, Ronnie Martin has been obsessed with writing the perfect synth-pop song. Actually, it’s been longer than that, if you include his work in Dance House Children and other pre-Joy Electric projects. But ever since 1994’s Melody, the man’s obsession has become especially pronounced.
This is most clearly seen in his production methods: throughout Joy Electric’s history, Martin has continually refined his craft, paring his music down to the barest, most necessary elements (the most recent Joy Electric albums, such as The Ministry Of Archers and The Otherly Opus, have used little more than his voice and a Moog).
This devotion is certainly laudable, but it’s easy to imagine how limiting such self-imposed restrictions could become. Which probably explains the numerous side-projects that Martin has become involved with in recent years—e.g., Shepherd, The Brothers Martin, The Foxglove Hunt, and now, Ronald Of Orange. But unlike those other projects, Ronald Of Orange is essentially a one-man operation. But it’s still an attempt to explore new music avenues not allowed by Joy Electric’s particular aesthetic.
St. Kilda
by St. Kilda
I’ve written before about those rare times when you truly “get” the music you’re listening to. When something clicks, and in a rare moment of synchronicity, music that may previously have been distant and obtuse becomes an integral part of your life, if only for a little while.
When, through some magical process, you can fill it seeping into your pores, settling underneath your skin, and filling in some crack in your psychic facade that you didn’t even know existed a few minutes prior to the experience.
I’ve found that those times usually happen when I’m exhausted, run ragged by the world, work, relationships, etc. In my fatigued state, my defenses are lowered. Music has a more curious pull over me in those times, when I’m more susceptible to its ebb and flow, and the emotional effect it can have.
The Ridings
by Northerner
Nebraska weather is perennially odd, but especially odd during the crossover weeks of late winter and early spring. During this time, it’s not uncommon for the weather to be relatively balmy one day, with plenty of sun and blue skies (enough to make you want to break out the shorts and sandals), but while you sleep that night with visions of sunny days floating through your dreams, several inches of snow will appear out of nowhere and blanket the city.
This can wreak havoc with one’s psyche, especially if you’re at all prone to some form of seasonal affective disorder. This constant lurching between opposite ends of the weather spectrum induces a strange kind of nostalgia and longing; you get just enough of a taste of spring to remember all of those gloriously warm and balmy days of yesteryear (which of course, are so much better as memories than they probably really were) and yet the sudden and shocking shifts back to winter weather, where Jack Frost comes howling back with a vengeance, causes one to wonder, with no small amount of despair, if the ice and sleet are ever going to disappear.
I mention all of this because the title track from Northerner’s debut full-length captures all of that climatological give and take in a way that took me by surprise. I’m always amazed at how the music that lands on my desk, and that spends the most time on my headphones is that which most closely mirrors the weather outside my windows. And as we’ve ping-ponged back and forth between winter and spring during the last few weeks, The Ridings has provided a fitting soundtrack.
The Sad Sea
by Hotel Hotel
In 2006, Hotel Hotel recorded their first full-length, allheroesareforeverbold. They then went on tour and got signed to drone/post-rock label par excellence Silber Records. However, shortly after arriving home from their tour, the band’s drummer disappeared at LaGuardia Airport (and has not been seen since). The band went into a tailspin and spent the next year trying to figure out where to go, when some guidance came from the strangest place.
As the story goes, the remaining members were holed up in a bar one night when a real, live, honest to God sea captain tried to convince them to join his quest to find the “Mary Celeste”, the ghost ship that was presumably found in 2001. The band declined the offer, but the encounter planted the seeds for what would eventually become The Sad Sea.
Tri EP
by Lansing-Dreiden
I know that I’ve written quite a bit concerning the struggles I’ve had to reconcile with the music of ultra-obtuse art collective Lansing-Dreiden—in fact, I’ve probably written more than I should. If anything, doing so has likely led me to fall into some uber-conceptual trap/artistic scheme cooked up by the outfit.
And as important as attempts, however puny they might be, at deeper criticism and whatnot might be, does it matter in the end if the music just does “it” for you, if it scratches that secret itch in your soul, gets your booty moving, makes you shake your head in awe/surprise/wonder, and so on?
I ask, because for all of their annoying artistic manifestos, Lansing-Dreiden’s mercurial music continues to do that. Their latest, the free-for-the-downloading Tri EP (visit their website), offers up three all-too-short tracks that shows off Lansing-Dreiden’s music in all of its glorious and maddening facets.
Dial M
by Starflyer 59
For some reason, I found myself reflecting on my “history” with Starflyer 59 when I discovered—a few weeks after the fact—that the band had released Dial M. I picked up their self-titled debut—aka Silver—shortly after it came out in 1994. Which means that I’ve been listening to their music for nearly fifteen years now.
That sort of longevity can lend itself to a sense of obligation, meaning you’ll pick up the artist’s album no matter what. And while such dedication is not a bad thing, it does mean that you have to prepare yourself for inevitable bouts of being underwhelmed (The Cure’s 4:13 Dream immediately comes to mind for me).
Such is not the case with Starflyer 59. There’s a workman-like quality to their music, to be sure. It’s not the sort of music that you listen to for wild innovation and experimentation, but rather to hear the tried and true (the innovation they do inevitably bring is just icing on the cake). For me, Starflyer 59’s music has become akin to an old, comfortable blanket or a sturdy oak desk: dependable and comfortable.
What’s interesting, though, is that Starflyer 59 has achieved that level of consistency despite constant personnel changes and shifts in musical direction throughout the years. Jason Martin has been the band’s single consistent player; at least a dozen others have joined him in the studio and onstage to date. And as for musical direction, Starflyer 59’s releases have dabbled in shoegazer, lounge, surf rock, ‘70s stadium rock, ‘50s pop, and electronica, ultimately settling into a brand of lushly produced indie-rock that incorporates elements from all of those aforementioned genres.
Exodus
by Alex Moulton
Let’s start this review off by stating the obvious, shall we? The album cover art for Alex Moulton’s Exodus is easily the most bitchin’ thing you’ll see all year. The Boris Vallejo/Julie Bell painting depicts a muscle-bound hero and a bikini-clad beauty soaring through the sky over a city being ravaged by fire, while a giant spaceship looms in the background.
In a word, “awesome”, the sort of artwork that Han Solo might paint on the side of the Millennium Falcon to celebrate the Kessel Run. What’s more, the artwork prepares you for something truly out-of-this world, a vintage, sci-fi, galacti-freakout so over the top that it makes albums like Daft Punk’s Discovery sound tame by comparison—which is almost certainly something that Moulton, with his background in the visual arts, intended.
Moulton and his collaborators certainly delve into the same sonic territory as the Punk, namely funky, “the future as imagined in 1978” synthesizer jams inspired by the likes of Giorgio Moroder, Tangerine Dream, and Vangelis. Vintage analog synthesizer sounds abound, ricocheting back and forth like laser beams and starlight, and Exodus as a whole has a suitably spaced out, sci-fi backdrop… but in the end, it is Exodus’ space opera that ends up being on the tamer side of things.
Dark Enough For Stars
by Au Revoir Borealis
When it came out that Au Revoir Borealis was working on a new album, I immediately had thoughts that something special was brewing on the horizon. While it had been eight years since their debut, 2000’s Tienken EP, and the bandmembers had since drifted off to various side-projects (e.g., For Wishes, The Great Fiction, and Man’s Last Great Invention), those early songs still stuck with me.
The Tienken EP showed great promise, revealing a band in love with a sound close to my heart while also hinting that Au Revoir Borealis weren’t just interested in a mere genre exercise, but also brought to bear in their music an emotional and spiritual warmth that their peers can often lack.
And now that it’s here, it’s safe to say that Dark Enough For Stars doesn’t really disappoint at all. While the album contains the same love of shoegazer/dream-pop evident in the earlier material, there’s a darker sophistication at work, as one might’ve guessed from the title (itself a play on a Ralph Waldo Emerson quote); there’s a definite melancholy amidst the swirl of sounds that lends itself to a contemplation perfectly suited for this burgeoning autumnal season.