SCQ's Winter Records 2012

Walking home from work the other evening – headphones on and lost in thought – I suddenly caught the distant sound of bird chatter. I tore off my headphones and stood alert in the night street, assured that those sounds of nature were beyond my headphones, but all I could detect was a dull wind. Unsurprisingly, I relocated the chirps of winged things after returning to my iPod, the upcoming Ulrich Schnauss album and a field recording nestled in the silence between tracks that I’d never heard before.

A kind of embarrassing tale to admit, given that we’re stuck in the darkest month of a Canadian winter, but it’s also fascinating to acknowledge how stretches of one season can make us long for even the finest details of another. With regards to hearing bird chatter at night, we residents of the globe’s northern reaches have a few months yet to wait, so why not embrace the cold with Skeleton Crew Quarterly’s latest winter recommendations?

Less than two months to go…

~ Love SCQ

Low Roar - Low Roar (SCQ's Winter Records 2012)

Low Roar

Low Roar

Tonequake Records.

SCQ Rating: 79%

“I won’t wake a wealthy man someday, cause the sun don’t follow me,” Ryan Karazija insists in the opening lyrics to Low Roar’s eponymous debut, and it’s a tough pessimism to pierce. As a twelve-song ode to the challenges of moving from California to Iceland and trying to adapt to a startling new life, Low Roar already carries some metaphorical (and literal – sorry, had to) baggage. But the self-titled record proves a harder nut to crack in light of how it projects that baggage, choosing a consistently dreary mood that reduces each song’s tempo to a chilling crawl. That uphill battle, daunting though it may be, beguilingly sets the stage for the many reasons you, dear reader, will want to stick around.

Each song plucked from the self-titled’s first handful of tracks conveys acoustic ruminations backed by two disparate palettes: a molasses-slow smear of buzzing organ (‘Give Up’ and ‘Patience’, the latter sounding like a minimal reduction of Coldplay’s grandiose ‘Politik’) and electronic ambience (‘Nobody Else’). Karazija establishes his Thom Yorke-styled vocals elegantly into both environments and somehow merges the wintry isolation of his words with a nestled coziness drawn out by his arrangements. His songwriting knack neither lightens nor slips over the course of its near hour, although one could argue that the remote feeling intentionally driving Karazija’s muse becomes detrimental to the album as a whole. As much as I appreciate the merits of later songs like ‘Rolling Over’ and the mournful ‘Help Me’, it’s tough to stick by the record uninterruptedly. That Low Roar’s single, ‘Tonight, Tonight, Tonight’ appears at the close of the song-cycle might be acknowledgement of the record’s long journey but it’s telling that I can’t tell you what it really sounds like.

Obviously a work of extreme intimacy, Low Roar bears a lyrical directness like the diary of a man abandoned to the edge of humanity. Still, it proves lush and evocative beyond Karazija’s supposedly stark confines and looks to connect with anyone susceptible to melancholy. If given the proper time to digest, Low Roar has all of the makings of an overlooked, if arduous, classic.

Always In Postscript - willamette (SCQ's Winter Records 2012)

Always In Postscript

willamette

Own Records.

SCQ Rating: 77%

In terms of a winter record, Always In Postscript is a no-brainer for both its tundra-like façade and being released amid the cavernous lows of January. It could be argued that the quality of ambience captured by willamette over these eight transient compositions has the potent chops to attach itself to any season and, while that could ultimately be the case, the moods swept up by these progressions breathe best in closed-up, wind-ravaged rooms. The album title seems to encourage an aftermath

Always In Postscript’s title references this notion of aftermath best, instilling further the collection’s winter-still sense of finality and remembrance through a minimal selection of blurred tape loops and subdued orchestration. Keyboard melodies rise just audibly above the clouded forces of ‘un court theme pour lyla’ and ‘balustrade’, allowing our minds to fasten these fragments into something personal. Often it’s the suggested elements of willamette’s composition that help Always In Postscript sidestep the expected Stars Of the Lid comparisons, while still providing an insular soundtrack to devote our memories to.

Noting how the difference between “insular” and “isolated” can carry giant repercussions on the resonating impact of an ambient record, it’s important to note that Always In Postscript bears too much warmth through its disciplined instrumentation to truly feel barren. Its blank slate landscape will absorb the listener’s surroundings and naturally react, with ‘images d’une longueur de cheveux’ and the title track likely to imbue an austere but romantic quality as well. However icy and fogged over its domain may sound, the listener remains sheltered. For that reason, Always In Postscript stands most impressively as a hibernation record.

Ghost Town - Owen (SCQ's Winter Records 2012)

Ghost Town

Owen 

Polyvinyl Records.

SCQ Rating: 83%

CMG Rating: 78%

Mike Kinsella doesn’t mince words. Which is to say, he’s a songwriter that finds little value in allusion or flowery imagery when he owns such a convincing arsenal of blunt honesty. Whether he’s bemoaning those who come out to his shows as “the idiots in the back” (“Curtain Call”) or detailing the vices of colleagues he despises (“Bad News”), Kinsella’s body of work under the Owen moniker often steers the introspection entitled to singer-songwriters toward a therapeutic extreme. For the first half of the 00s, Kinsella’s muse bounced between romantic betrayal and self-righteous self-pity; he typically starred as the victim and recorded these albums at his mother’s house. You’re probably starting to get the picture.

Nonetheless, Owen has amassed a humble career by telling it how it is, and it works because that unflinching honesty which bandages his bad days also unravels Kinsella’s vast emotional core. Ghost Town mostly busies itself with the latter task. The Chicago-based musician’s keen ear for tender arrangements has rarely found such a match, muse-wise, as when Kinsella executes the father/daughter coming-of-age lullaby  “Mother’s Milk Breath”. Owen’s vocal delivery managed to poeticize plain speech even back when he was singling out random bar girls to score with (on “Poor Souls”, from 2002’s No Good For No One Now), so it’s hardly surprising to hear how disarmingly his timbre sits upon balladry that deals with anything other than him being an asshole.

Luckily, as his focus on formative heartbreak has slowly graduated to the trials of marriage and children, Owen’s catalog has likewise matured in sound. Supplementing his once stark acoustic foundations and intricate electric guitar flourishes are lush accompaniments – like the heart-string tugging orchestral bits underlying “Too Many Moons” and “An Animal” – that rendered New Leaves (2009) such an upgrade. As well as deepening the dramatic stakes, Ghost Town offers fresh bite with a dissonance that takes center-stage in “No Place Like Home”’s peppered guitar work and “I Believe”’s defiant, kick-drum riddled climax. 

Keep in mind: these are Owen-styled rock songs, in essence his sad-sack acoustic fare boosted to mid-tempo with extra feedback. Still, Ghost Town’s poles present a curious divide for Kinsella to walk following the perfectly measured and orchestrated New Leaves. Gone is that album’s wistful nostalgia and unhurried tree-ring counting; here, Owen has illustrated a scene greater than his ego, one that jostles between faith and resignation with regards to loved ones, family, friends, and the greater socio-political headaches we consider rites of passage. 

In what stands as perhaps his sole – if overarching – allegory, the “ghost town” Owen sketches out over these nine tracks is just bittersweet reality; the expectation and eventual hope that whatever house and people you leave on the way to the office (or, say, week one of a two-week tour) will be changeless when you return. “I’m home and somehow while I was gone,” he sings on “The Armoire”. “This house I’d left for dead had lingered on.” Despite singing “I’ve a thirst for skirts and hell to raise…” a few songs later, Kinsella now accepts the cozy shackles of his lifestyle with a minimum of begrudging sentiment. And if it’s within that claustrophobic, anti-rock star environment that brings Owen his songwriting transcendence, the irony certainly isn’t lost on him.

(This review was originally published on CokeMachineGlow...)

R+B=? - Aeroc

R+B=?

Aeroc

Ghostly International.

SCQ Rating: 80%

Would I be remiss to suggest that people who don’t listen to electronic music would find R+B=? the perfect excuse to absolve themselves from ever giving the genre a shot? A cursory listen would seem to support the idea, given the record’s relaxed break-beats and the clinical, bubbly tones that politely surround them. As if strict rock enthusiasts didn’t already have enough prejudice concerning the merits of electronic music, the fact that Aeroc’s opening track is called ‘Spaced Out’ just furthers the assumption that R+B=? belongs on a bong shelf somewhere. Personally, I’m more than happy to keep them in the dark.

That’s because R+B=? just begs to be underestimated. As it turns out, boasting an affinity for turn-of-the-millenium lounge and reworking downtempo beats won’t really resonate with the perverted crossover culture of 2012, but those who stick with Aeroc’s austere workouts for repeated listens will uncover a satisfying and sophisticated collection of minimal techno. What churns Aeroc’s game to another level is the abundance of acoustic guitar featured here; the looped strums on ‘Soflo’ evoke the chill-out template of Kruder & Dorfmeister and yet take on a new momentum through the intricate picking on ‘For Sake’. At its atmospheric prime, White’s guitar work melds into the placid body of his electronic composition with the accomplished air of Boards of Canada’s The Campfire Headphase, unveiling deeper layers to ‘You Say That’ and ‘If I Had the Time’.

The initial feeling of sterility that may ward off curious listeners is merely space, the sort of uncluttered openness that directs our focus to the details (like, say, what’s actually a consistently deft display of beat-programming) or allows our mind to swim in Aeroc’s brainy diversions. R+B=? is far too straight-laced and exclusive to convert anyone’s narrow notions of electronic music. And on behalf of everyone who treats this album as a secret soundtrack, we’re just fine with that.

Aeroc - Spaced Out

Overgrown - Tapage

Overgrown

Tapage

Tympanik Audio.

SCQ Rating: 79%

Tympanik Audio may yet be a major-player in the electronic realm but there’s no refuting the reputation it’s garnering. Turning a cast of mysterious monikers – such as Displacer, Stendeck and C.H. District – into absorbing, poorly kept secrets, the Chicago-based imprint heads into 2012 with another head-swimming dose of IDM beats and atmospherics.

Released but a year after his collaboration with Meander, Overgrown finds Tapage traversing more achingly beautiful melodies and tough, intricate beats. Only this time Tapage’s alone at the helm, allowing his warm tones to stretch and convulse far over Overgrown’s alien landscape. As ‘Loss’ brings the album into bloom with a brilliant overlap of keys and morphing analog loops, ‘Pink Mist’ steps back into less structured brain-candy that is slow to pick up emotional steam. Although the beautiful tracks outweigh the occasional meander, the album carries on trading gorgeous couplets of ambient-IDM tracks (‘Ethyl’, ‘Pockets’) for the odd case of cerebral noodling (‘Leptoid’).

Now there’s nothing inept concerning Tapage’s experiments – they’re accomplished assemblages of varying ideas – but some sonic adventures fail to develop the record’s canvas (which at sixty-four minutes, runs on the long side). Overgrown flirts with the real possibility of containing too much of a good thing and, taking that into consideration, a schizophrenic collage like ‘Mimic’ feels redundant against the poignancy lacing Aphex Twin-worthy ‘Xyloplax’ or the slow-building ‘Unfolding’. Tapage proves himself a maestro in the soft-hued IDM field when operating around a committed melodic core and, luckily for us, Overgrown spends the vast majority of its run-time centered on that particular strength.