Embers From the Underground #2: Building Castles Out of Matchsticks

Welcome to the second installment of EFTU; the bi-monthly spotlight that lands upon a particular SCQ-favourite artist and delves into their most recent work. This month’s artist, Building Castles Out of Matchsticks (nom de plume for Anne Sulikowski), first came to my attention via Chat Blanc Records’ Myspace, whereby her moving drone-pop compositions quickly reintroduced me to that detached excitement of listening to music through social media sites. Since falling for those select cuts – a few of which from Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit (review below) – I’ve begun wandering the breadth of Sulikowski’s concentrated discography with great enthusiasm, ditching Myspace streams for full-album immersions. And from the sounds of this interview, the journey is just getting underway.

Fresh from final exams and dazed with post-school possibilities, Building Castles Out of Matchsticks offered some time recently to discuss her art-centric universe, Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit and many future projects on the way. Without further ado...

SCQ: First thing’s first, Building Castles Out of Matchsticks is what you’ve described as a universe unto itself, with photography, intimate writings and a great deal of mystery filling the corners of your many sonic endeavors. Taking into consideration your school studies, your radio show (Bleeps and Hums) and maintaining a personal life, how have you kept this all-encompassing project so potent?

Anne Sulikowski: I’ve always had loads of energy. Not having television and not reading the newspaper for years has made my imagination go wild. It’s a strange sort of drive I have, to always take photos or record music. Although I know many people I spend a good deal of my time alone, and usually I either daydream or wander and then spend endless moments attempting to somehow put it all together... Like a recap. So I won’t forget, you know. And by alone I do not necessarily mean devoid of people. It’s more of a state of mind I guess, and It is these times that I record. A connection in the form of a distraction… I’m very much absorbed with life, and I think for hours relentlessly about it. It’s entertaining yet also quite melancholic. So this cycle of introspection is what really drives me to do everything creative, and I feel this need to like share it with anyone, someone. It’s almost like I feel it makes it more real somehow, the notion that someone else understands where I’ve been. Be it through a photo or a song lyric it is through this random connection that I feel less detached in the world. Being surrounded by others does not mean you have found many connections so this musical drive is what has kept me in touch with the reality of this world.

I have spent my last few years getting my degree in nursing, where I have focused on psychiatric care and surgical post-op care. It had taken up a great deal of my time, much more than I was prepared to give, but I have found my studies to be quite rewarding as a goal of mine is to use musical recording as psychotherapy for the treatment of chronic schizophrenia at the psychiatric hospital here in Hamilton Ontario. Caring for the very sick and mentally ill has made me more introspective than ever before, and I feel very fortunate to have been exposed to this experience. I do though, regret very much, all the time that has been stolen for me. I did manage to record quite a bit, Recorded a new EP and enough songs in the works for a new castles album, which I plan to release sometime late summer.

SCQ: How did you become involved with Chat Blanc records? And has joining that roster impacted how you record or regard your work?

Anne Sulikowski: I met Pascal in 2005 at a Below the Sea show in the wasteland of Hamilton. He was the drummer and I was recording the show off the soundboard for them. A friend of mine knew him and we were introduced and since then we have become very good friends. He asked me to do a release with his label and although it took me awhile to record the EP I was thrilled that he released it. I love his indie approach and his cute little CD packages…

I never let a label influence my work, I always just sort of record and then worry about release later. I do very much love DIY labels, indie approaches, interesting packages and artist centered labels.

SCQ: In an interview from last year, you mentioned that Secret Land found you ‘where you should be’. How has the passing of time affected that statement? And as a Polaroid snap-shot, where does this EP find you?

Anne Sulikowski: Nothing is constant for me. I always feel I am where I should be until another day has passed.


SCQ: Compared to the ominous weight that weaves through your past albums, Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit contains moments so clear-headed and spacious, they nearly sound unburdened (‘Sugar Bleeps’, for example). Was there any intention to lift the shroud of mystery surrounding Building Castles Out of Matchsticks on this release? Do you see this EP as a sonic departure?

Anne Sulikowski: Since chat blanc release mostly mini CD, I had to limit the sounds I selected for the release, which in all honesty I found most difficult to, since I usually have many pieces of music in the works at the same time. Sometimes I even forget things I’ve recorded and find them so gratefully at unexpected times.

I selected the songs more for meanings rather than flow, and chose the more stand-out bits. The vocals presented are at times more clear than usual, for me that is, but still I find are misread and misinterpreted. And by no way is that a bad thing, I take things and make them into something else all of the time, and that is really what it comes down to with music…personal interpretation, emotional recognition.

The song Like a dream in the night is actually a lyric from a song written in the 60s by Joe Brown. A few years ago I took the last car ride ever with my father from the hospital to my parents home. He passed away a few months later. When someone dies, it is strange the things you forget and what you remember. Those months were a blur for me. But I remember that song come on the radio and watching my father look out the window as it was playing. The sky was grey, everything seemed still.

Sugar Bleeps was recorded a couple of years ago. It was sequenced in a car in the sun close to a field. I have portable gear, and outdoor electronics is one of my favorite things ever. This track is light and less intense then my usual output, and its more about pausing than anything else.

But I will admit that I find myself smiling loads these days.

The rest of the album is scattered in emotional intensity, but still is rooted with so many questions and stories of false promises and being lost. Many nights of insomnia influenced most of these recordings. Falling over furniture is not a song about being drunk, although this is often an outcome of too many drinks and not enough lights on.

SCQ: It must be asked: what are you currently working on?

Anne Sulikowski: I am planning a new castles release this summer with new recordings and some recordings I have worked on the past year that were not finished because of school. I have worked with science north in the form of remixes, and we are planning on releasing a split this year. Also, splits with millimetrik, Love Puppets and absent without leave will be in the future. I’m really like all over split releases these days.

Besides that, now that I am finished school I plan to spend a lot more time wandering.

Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit - Building Castles Out of Matchsticks

Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit

Building Castles Out of Matchsticks
Chat Blanc Records.

SCQ Rating: 80%

Even in this fruitful age of communication and information, collecting a cohesive assemblage of Building Castles Out of Matchsticks' releases is next to impossible. With full-lengths and EPs scattered over numerous labels and collaborations ranging from split records to dedicated side-projects, Anne Sulikowski’s prolific streak seems in keeping with her muse; endlessly unfurling and inspired by the greater mysteries. Somewhere between her swelling universe of drones and beats, Sulikowski’s voice has always been the guide, equal parts timid and sensual, leading listeners through the fog and forestry. The latest of these sound-excursions, Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit, seems to have found a live trail through the confounding maze which is Sulikowski’s discography, revealing crystalline melodies just beneath the haze.

Not that Building Castles Out of Matchsticks ever sounded melodically malnourished; in fact, 2008’s Secret Land was positively swirling with them, a cesspool of tones so interwoven, half the record’s fun was trying to pull them apart. What marks an immediate shift with Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit is how open and lucid it sounds, as if the ominous clouds protecting Secret Land have been banished in favour of visceral swings separating laptop noise from pastoral serenity. On the respective ends of this spectrum lies ‘And Still I Have Never Been Able to Read a Map’, a whirling hotbed of chaotic crashes over multi-layered drones, and ‘Sugar Bleeps’, a brilliantly sparse composition of ricocheting tones and exhaled space. As for the classic Building Castles Out of Matchsticks vocal material we’ve come to expect, it occupies the middle of these two sonic poles and makes for the EP’s most propulsive moments. ‘Like a Dream In the Night’ is a cool night-drive, riding effortlessly on tight beat-programming and eloquent Eastern-vibe keys while ‘Tes Cheveaux Dans Mon Visage’ crests on heavenly keys and memorable vocal hooks.

The EP format doesn’t accommodate a ton of room for gloomy segues and, as a reaction, I can’t help but miss Sulikowski’s knack for creating beautiful branch-off tracks like ‘Secret Land’. Instead of vying for her previous work’s epic sprawl, Comme Un Reve, Dans La Nuit earns its stripes as a sparkling and succinct collection that wanders the boundaries of her self-defined “drone-pop”. It’s a brief journey, but one worth repeating as soon as it’s finished.

Clinging To a Scheme - The Radio Dept

Clinging to a Scheme

The Radio Dept
Labrador Records.

SCQ Rating: 63%

The Radio Dept has long held a coveted seat in the indie world’s VIP room, with little more than two full-lengths and an assortment of collectibles to show for it. I won’t contend the worth of those records as I’ve yet to hear them but if their quality is equivalent to 2010’s delayed-forever Clinging to a Scheme, I motion to make a vacancy of The Radio Dept’s lofty seat. The production value is unmistakable and the instrumentation is likewise ear-catching on first spin, but the time when a record like Clinging to a Scheme would’ve been unique, let alone groundbreaking, has passed by a solid half-decade. Now it’s just fashionably phoned-in.

For the sake of this reading like a review, however, instead of a one-sided rant, let’s look at the record’s noteworthy moments. With interlaced acoustics and restrained piano, ‘A Token of Gratitude’ captures all the calm and emotional resonance of a rainy afternoon while the decidedly more muscular ‘David’ sets its sights on hard-hitting Balearic pop. Perhaps most surprisingly visceral is ‘The Video Dept’, a crashing anthem of lo-fi electrics and warbling vocals that rises from a basement-venue’s dirge into a live-off-the-floor jam. Is it actually live, me thinks not, considering Clinging to a Scheme’s tweaked-clean production, but the energy of the track manages to keep listeners actively in tune. Finally, ‘Four Months In the Shade’ evokes some of the fanatical descriptors I’ve caught in the past regarding this trio, as the densely arranged track – collaging found-sound ambience against gritty breakbeats – gives me a glimmer of The Radio Dept’s notorious back-catalogue. None of these pleasant entries distract from the overall feeling that The Radio Dept sound like just another polite act from rural England or snowy Scandinavia, gauzy but polite, sophisticated yet wholly benign. It’s a well-formed, summery record with a surface-level of emotion that hasn’t the depth to do much else.

Dear God, I Hate Myself - Xiu Xiu

Dear God, I Hate Myself

Xiu Xiu
Kill Rock Stars.

SCQ Rating: 83%

“Transgressive” as Jamie Stewart has maintained his brand through the years and many releases, an equally appropriate descriptor for Xiu Xiu is undoubtedly “perplexing”. Upon the arrival of this, Stewart’s seventh full-length, critics have begun questioning whether Xiu Xiu has finally tipped into self-parody, to which I say: where’ve you been? Going back to the California band’s break-out, did any of these columnists look at the cover of Fabulous Muscles? Could they not understand Stewart’s painstaking warble in ‘I Luv the Valley, OH!’ to be communicating “my behind is a beehive”? Stewart’s lyrics have always walked a line of dark, even nerdy, humour - no less strictly than how his songs consistently threaten to deconstruct around your very ears – and his refusal to garner goth-cred through self-seriousness has, in no small part, warded off the very parody that grips most goth-figureheads.

Even with a title like Dear God, I Hate Myself – more befitting for a lame-o emo outfit of angsty teenagers than a well-read artist of thirty-eight years – Xiu Xiu continues to perplex their most ardent followers like a joke-filled suicide letter. “If you are expecting consolation / I will become outrageous / If you expect me to be outrageous / I will be extra outrageous” Stewart quivers in ‘Gray Death’, an opener which, through graceful strings and abrupt guitar distortion, introduces the contributions of new Xiu Xiu collaborator Angela Seo. Filling the shoes of recently departed band-mate Caralee McElroy (a fan-favourite), Seo arrives in time to share a particularly glitchier direction for Xiu Xiu, one that sparkles on the pretty-much perfect dance track ‘Chocolate Makes You Happy’ and flirts with industrial noise on the Nintendo DS-composed ‘Secret Motel’. As with every Xiu Xiu album I’ve heard, Dear God, I Hate Myself features the requisite few standoffish tracks, like ‘Apple For a Brain’ which never quite finds itself, but even those misfires (‘Impossible Feeling’, ‘Falkland Rd’) have a fractured orchestration that feels justly overcast and bittersweet. Whatever they lack in catchiness or cohesiveness is countered well by their mood, which fills the gaps of stronger cuts like ‘This Too Shall Pass Away (For Freddy)’ and the touching ‘House Sparrow’.

Dear God, I Hate Myself isn’t a self-parody so much as a leveling out of several long-running Xiu Xiu themes: catharsis, sex, religion, trauma, self-harm and bondage (you know, the usual…). That half of these subjects are communicated in the record’s title alone indeed illustrates an influx of plain-spoken drama to these songs, as if Stewart’s bouts of depression have spiraled into shock-me desperation. What a tempting theory that might’ve been had Dear God, I Hate Myself lacked the guts necessary to rival Xiu Xiu’s best efforts, but it has those guts, and smears them proudly on the mirror. This isn’t a record of desperation, it’s a record of assuredness. Assuredness through outlandishness.

Subject To Shift - Solvent

Subject To Shift

Solvent
Ghostly International.

SCQ Rating: 78%

Solvent (Jason Amm) first entered my aural stratosphere with Apples and Synthesizers, a record that wrestled to forge his early laptop ticks with an increasing affinity for rave-up electro. Amm’s technique was never in doubt so much as his direction, as his dreamy melodies were concocted with dance-elements so sharp, the songs felt too abrasive for easy-listening, too measured to really go mental to. So when I received word of Solvent’s return, six years and two compilation/companion releases since Apples and Synthesizers, I greeted the potential of Subject To Shift with the same distanced lethargy. Instead of confounding listeners with another clash of styles, Subject To Shift is a straightforward embrace of noir electronica, covering both the luxurious appeal of heady techno and the retro fascination of synth-pop.

Early highlight and first single ‘Loss For Words’ goes a great distance to incite just what rough edges Amm has buffered from his repertoire since the mid-point of the 00’s. With bubbly post-Give Up programming underscoring a collage of half-formed melodies, ‘Loss For Words’ carries the clear-headedness of verse/chorus electro-pop but the minuscule details of a top-class producer. And it’s that combination of hook-infused catchiness and clever embellishments that light fire to Subject To Shift’s dancefloor affair. ‘Formulate’ and ‘Don’t Forget the Phone’ dig into the Depeche Mode crate and come out with fresh electro takes on a timeless sound already crooned over by groups like Junior Boys. When Solvent isn’t employing vocoder-laced vocals or 3AM-on-eight-balls energy, he’s finessing some of his most accessible, romantic instrumentals to date. ‘A Product Of the Process’ ignites his dreamy keys with a propulsive beat while ‘Panoramic’ closes the disc on an airy, optimistic note; the key to both tracks’ success lying in Amm’s less confrontational beat-mincing.

As with any appropriation of retro-stylings, Subject To Shift has a few are-you-serious moments; none more smirk-inspiring than ‘Take Me Home’, where a vocal-effect’s low-growl sounds as if Dr. Claw from the Inspector Gadget cartoon is grinding up on you in a dark club, talking dirty in your ear. Despite its sinister veneer, these odd moments give the disc a familiar, Solvent-esque charm. Whereas Solvent’s early oeuvre seemed weakened by over-thinking and needless complication, Subject To Shift filters his cerebral compositions into a pulse-hijacking, synth-pop groove. Make no assumptions about this surprising and decadent return.

Hella - The Young Friends

Hella

The Young Friends
Moodgadget Records.

SCQ Rating: 75%

Andrew McKee and Brant Stuns bonded over surf music, the sub-genre as well as the sandy dunes and rickety boardwalks that evoke its breezy tunefulness. Nothing calmed and invigorated these high school kids like a bike-trip to San Diego’s coastline, and although composed and recorded in a bedroom of the two’s desert city in Arizona, their mindset was always on the beach. So is Hella, the sun-bleached debut EP courtesy of Moodgadget Records that eschews formalities in favour of concise, addictive summer pop.

Fittingly, surf music only plays a part in The Young Friends’ multi-layered approach. From the opening slur of hazy keys and peppy drums, ‘Be My Baby’ introduces this pop duo as welders of chill-wave production and Vampire Weekend’s tight rhythms. The latter influence is especially evident in the opening seconds of single ‘Make Out Point’, with its tense but playful bassline, while its surf-abilly vibes and vocal haze screams summer evenings. What I particularly love about McKee’s voice – besides my impression that he resembles a Boys Don’t Cry era Robert Smith – is how his pronunciation and layered style stretches his vocals dreamily over the compact instrumentation. No matter how the songs might echo the casual cool of the Strokes on ‘North End’ or the Smiths-meets-African rhythm on ‘Riverside Kids’, those distant-call vocals web the whole of Hella into a song-cycle as nostalgic with yesterday as it is smitten with the eternal now.

While certainly a debut brimming with promise, it’s a shame that the whole venture lasts just short of twenty minutes. Such a meager running-time no doubt negates some of the impact Hella, at times, seems eager to cause among indie-circles, but what this EP may lack in presence it makes up for by never slipping up. If Hella is any indication, The Young Friends will be rubbing shoulders with their influences very soon.

Hey Buddy, Dummy - The Robots

Hey Buddy, Dummy

The Robots
Night Danger Records.

SCQ Rating: 85%

A few Fridays ago, I was watching the last hour of work crawl by and imagining all the remedies I’d need to feel like myself again. There was a bottle of wine sitting idly on a vendor’s shelf awaiting my fist, some fresh air loitering the outside backstreets to flush my pores of stale office air and a record by The Robots sitting in SCQ’s digital mailbox. Beyond their menacing promotional track ‘I Didn’t Know What I Was Saying’, I knew nothing of this P.E.I.-based outfit or their full-length debut but one thing was clear: Friday night was going to be a five-alarm breakout and Hey Buddy, Dummy would cater the decompression with wall-shaking authority. My lofty hopes for this record I’d never heard were met, then overpowered, as Hey Buddy, Dummy is more than just a throwdown rock album; it’s a commanding song-cycle of muscular indie-rock, original and uncompromising.

If my expectations, rooted in those testosterone-sparked drums and Jonny Greenwood-inspired guitar squalls swamping ‘I Didn’t Know What I Was Saying’, led me down a path to blistered six-strings, opener ‘Are You Mine’ had me double-taking with a moody arrangement that thunders forward into piano-rich melancholy and Peter Rankin’s layered coos. The bar is set (and set high, in case you weren’t paying attention), leaving the rest of Hey Buddy, Dummy the tall order of living up to such a stellar start. The Robots deliver, reigniting their doomladen electrics with the vampiric intensity of ‘ShudderBoxin’ and working eerie guitar lines between the rock dynamics of ‘Drunk Uncles’ and ‘Prester John’. Never leaving itself open to easy criticism, Hey Buddy, Dummy camouflages its predominantly mid-tempo pacing with structure-shifts that swing a song’s narrative to drastic poles; take, for example, how ‘The Cape’ moves from early Tortoise mood-setting to late Coldplay climaxing. Um, that’s a heavy change-up, and for The Robots to manage such headstrong maneuvers without showing their stitches is commendable, indeed.

Even if you’ve only heard it once and can’t recall a single melody, Hey Buddy, Dummy has a memorable presence, as if its ten songs were modeled from guitars and vocals no differently than how a house is distinguished by brick and stone. Without reaching for postures or pretensions, The Robots carry a dramatic strain reminiscent of The Dears and early Radiohead, the kind you feel from start to finish but never hear coming. It's the absolute best way to blindside your Friday night.

Everybody Knows It's Gonna Happen Only Not Tonight - The Go Find

Everybody Knows It’s Gonna Happen Only Not Tonight

The Go Find
Morr Music.

SCQ Rating: 65%

Making an air-tight case for The Go Find as either doe-eyed sentimentalists or wisely-trained minimalists has always been pretty tough. Sure, we could tell they loved Fleetwood Mac without them repeatedly professing it and those swirling Death Cab For Cutie comparisons had some teeth to them, but it was difficult deriding the Antwerp-based group on account of Stars On the Wall – a record that balanced softie melancholy with Morr’s crafty beats. It was what it was; the optimum word being lovely.

Everybody Knows It’s Gonna Happen Only Not Tonight almost manages to skirt its cumbersome name with a title track that picks up right where Dieter Sermeus and Co. left off in 2007. Boasting the same rhythmic prowess and warm synths, The Go Find experiment early with a handful of brass riffing off one another; a small detail, yes, but small details make good Go Find records. Those well-placed xylophone-chimes scattered over ‘Just a Common Love ‘’s dense acoustics provide an unforgettable sense of nostalgia, whereas the percolating 80s guitar in ‘Heart of Gold’ (no, not a cover) gives a soft lens to vague romanticism. Instead of these arrangements working hand-in-hand with Sermeus’ songwriting, as on previous outings, Everybody Knows It’s Gonna Happen… pads its near forty minutes with a fair share of twee-filler. The predictable verse/chorus tepidness of ‘One Hundred Percent’ and ‘Running Mates’ is compounded by tossed off lyrical blunders that hardly stand for their own intended insightfulness. Had the album’s late-middle been stripped off, Everybody Knows It’s Gonna Happen… would’ve made an impressive, if overdue, EP. In its current form, however, The Go Find prove that those electronic details do much to sell their soft-rock ambitions.

Catch A Rainbow EP - Her Magic Wand

Catch a Rainbow EP

Her Magic Wand
Independent/Bandcamp.

SCQ Rating: 76%

The idea that band-influences are all misdirection, an attempt to cozy up or bridge one’s sound to more familiar scenes, is a claim I’m often tempted to side with. Cynical though it may be, the world has witnessed too many “new Dylans” and “new Radioheads” crash and burn to ignore the irresponsible power of creating silly sonic ancestries. Yet the ties that do bind musicians are often band-related, forged after pioneering bands that impressed upon a generation reason to push the proverbial envelope. My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, Sparklehorse; these are bands who’ve inadvertently written indie-rock beyond their lifespans and, all of which, bands cited on Her Magic Wand’s influence-list. With smaller bands noted for their respective niche – Air, Album Leaf, AmAnSet – nestled alongside these iconic bands, all band-influences can’t be misdirection; after all, I knew I’d like Her Magic Wand before I’d even pressed play on his Myspace page.

The idea that these influences become paint-by-number telltales between author and imitator has its ring of truth as well. Catch A Rainbow EP operates like a cleverly appropriated mixtape idolizing all of Charles Braud’s musical love affairs, taking to posh electronic songwriting on the well-titled ‘Clouding Effect’ or careening the open-chord dissonance of ‘Drowned Into It’. Yet as much as these atmospheres announce a kinship to indie-tronic or shoegaze heroes (yah, as if nobody has borrowed from My Bloody Valentine before…), Her Magic Wand never wears a sound for the sake of its stylishness. Instead these influences colour Braud’s confident songwriting, providing dew to the guitar effects of ‘Mistakes’ and imbuing texture to the soothing balladry of ‘Blank Memory Track’, a highlight that breaks into a live-drum thrust of sensitive energy. Containing four songs plus an instrumental segue, Catch A Rainbow EP rides a glossy rollercoaster that knows just when to leave its listeners wanting more. If first impressions relay nothing beyond the acknowledgement that Braud has impeccable taste in music, Her Magic Wand’s latest suggests he also knows exactly how to wield it into something fresh and noteworthy.

Spring Records 2010

And then, out of nowhere, the sun returns!

In no way did I hope to post my annual Spring Records selections so early in April, mostly due to my move to snowy Ottawa but also because a first day of beautiful weather usually backlashes into one last winter hurrah. Yet after the warm, summery weekend and a few days of rainfall, I knew the time was right to showcase some albums I’ve held onto for soundtracking just this season.

The most faithful of SCQ readers might be wondering where Springtime Super Moose is, as this is typically his moment to shine. All I can say is I'll try to snap a new shot of him when I go to New England in a few weeks. Until then, give these records a shot; they're certainly worth shaking out of hibernation for…

Broken Bells - Broken Bells (Spring Records 2010)

Broken Bells

Broken Bells
Sony Records.

SCQ Rating: 84%

For a few years, my only impression of The Shins was tied into my admiration for Natalie Portman, as I figured you have to be a pretty great actress to convince a restless generation that The Shins are the greatest thing ever. It was a half-joke mostly told because I’d never felt one way or another about the James Mercer-fronted indie-rock band; their most celebrated songs merely pleasant place-settings for a mixtape’s cool-off point. That I had a similarly uncommitted knowledge of Danger Mouse (AKA Brian Burton) and what he’s about makes my interest in Broken Bells, the duo’s collaborative debut, more than a little bewildering. Even for those with an intimate knowledge of each author’s expertise, Broken Bells is a patient revelation.

The emphasis journalists have placed on this self-titled effort being the result of one-on-one collaboration from the writing to mixing stage is an important one to distinguish from the mp3-trading, Postal Service method that so many acts rely on. Mercer essentially moved into Burton’s Los Angeles residence, crashing sporadically over the past year and a half to write and record upwards of thirty songs. Another comforting truth behind Broken Bells is that this creative partnership is no one-off; they’re a forward-looking band already hinting that many leftover tracks that didn’t gel on the first album might see the light of day on a forthcoming release. Amazingly, this prolific mentality shows no signs of rush or fatigue across Broken Bells’ ten tracks; in fact, these songs camouflage their ambitious streak under some pretty heavy moods and lyrical sentiments (the numbing existentialism behind ‘Citizen’, the restless cynicism motivating ‘Your Head Is On Fire’). Anyone who, like me, didn’t anticipate such daunting themes from a Danger Mouse-related project can appreciate how these sad-sack moments, which arc convincingly throughout the album’s thirty-seven minutes, compliment the radio-ready staccato rhythm guitar of ‘The Ghost Within’ or the Beatles-esque orchestration that pokes into ‘Sailing To Nowhere’. Is this a slick bedroom record or a deceptive party soundtrack? Which end of this temperamental spectrum trumps the other? That such mellow emotions merge with ease to stylish, peppy instrumentation makes Broken Bells a multi-layered success, complex but accessible.

In an interview that has seemingly disappeared from the web, Danger Mouse stated that one of his many intense conversations with Mercer centered around a recent NASA report claiming that our entire solar system is but a link in a chain of millions, a fact which likely relieves as many people as it depresses. With such curious and open-minded discussion, it’s no surprise that Broken Bells is as varied and downright cosmic, with well-rounded compositions always snooping into the outer envelope of left-field pop. The duo’s willingness to explore, whether it be Mercer’s exciting vocal turns (Shins fans won’t forget an unexpected falsetto move...) or Danger Mouse’s magician’s cap of sonic maneuvers, ensures this one of the best debuts of the year.

Endless Falls - Loscil (Spring Records 2010)

Endless Falls

Loscil
Kranky Records.

SCQ Rating: 79%

Few things in this world mean as much to me as rain; comforting and beautiful, I could listen to it, stare through or stand in it for an indefinite span of hours, temperature permitting. So maybe I’m too possessive to join the choir of critics praising Loscil (aka Scott Morgan) for bookending his new album with the sound of rainfall but really, any Vancouverite who chooses to base his recordings around rain is about as ingenious as a Californian who courageously writes a record about celebrity. Really, what’s my problem? I’m jealous… that Morgan has taken up subject matter so dear to my heart and on its broad, beautiful theme truly delivered an ambient record worth getting soaked over.

For a concept of such watery constitution, title track ‘Endless Falls’ breaks off any rippling, liquid impulses with warm strings, layered above one another in upward progressions before peaking, subtly, into the album’s first “fall”. Its fireside coziness could be considered a red herring, throwing listeners off-track before ‘Estuarine’ sets the record’s moody, overall drizzled tone, but its aim to boast Morgan’s ability to filter opposing textures into one formidable pedigree is dead-on. From there, Loscil does what Loscil does best, engaging various facets of a singular theme into cohesive brain-candy. Motorizing his still-life puddles with padded bass and rain-sheet rhythms, ‘Shallow Water Blackout’ is at once static and oscillating while even ‘Showers Of Ink’ - the furthest ambient plain on record – undulates on its own cerebral momentum. Forgive the liquid hyperbole but it must be said: Endless Falls is the sound of dub drowned-out, its heavy accents barely detectable in waves, its richness amplified to waterlogged ears.

The last thing you’d expect to distract from this overcast of steadfast atmospheres is a human voice, above all that of Destroyer’s Dan Bejar, so it’s a curious finale when ‘The Making of Grief Point’ ends the disc on such a wild-card experiment. In spoken-word’s great divide between pretentious and exciting, Bajar’s monologue lands shruggingly in the middle, partly because it discusses ambient music during Endless Falls’ least ambient track but mostly because Bejar’s aimless conversation clutters what is an exciting piece of music sans collaboration. It’s far from unlistenable but when an album is so grippingly bottomless to wander through, a left-field guest vocalist isn’t on most listeners’ radars. In terms of Kranky ambience, Endless Falls matches the lasting quality of Tim Hecker’s An Imaginary Country by chasing a more nuanced, serene muse. A triumphant return for Loscil.

Similes - Eluvium (Spring Records 2010)

Similes

Eluvium
Temporary Residence.

SCQ Rating: 81%

“I’m a vessel between two places I’ve never been,” intones Matthew Cooper over the petal-soft piano of ‘The Motion Makes Me Last’, and it’s certainly a moment to savour. Like how a freeze-frame of reality can concrete to one’s memory, this lyric alone sums up the quiet hesitation of choosing one path over another and living with the consequences. Such are the boundaries of Similes’ mentality, a record dedicated to Cooper’s personal deliberations as much as it is cratered by an obvious sonic progression. Gone are Copia’s post-classical meanderings that often sounded as ambient as a junior-high piano recital and lost are the gauzy epics that bogged down Cooper’s focus; what is Similes if not the clairvoyant, unhurried jewel beneath that former record’s rocky terrain, a mystic knowledge acquired through those growing pains? The assuredness muscled at the roots of these eight songs are both reflective and seemingly enthralled by their very existence… so when Cooper sings about being a vessel between two unknown ends, it’s completely viable that one end is personal, the other professional.

A less subtle acknowledgement to that lyric is that, um, there are lyrics on an Eluvium record! Beyond his recent welcoming of verse-and-chorus structures, Cooper’s inconspicuous vocals warrant recognition as the biggest risk of his seven-year career. Whether treading low and cautiously over ‘Leaves Eclipse The Night’’s humid rustling or leading the finale ‘Cease To Know’, these vocal outings consistently hint at an emotional punch not worth engaging in forthright. Similes is more effective shadowboxing anyway, creating highlights out of missed climaxes and reveries out of sidewalk-wandered self-analysis. To call this album introverted doesn’t even do it justice; to recognize that every song with lyrics is centered around the word “mind” is getting warmer. As gently cohesive as Similes feels, it remains a brazen progression that will cause some Eluvium fans to turn up their noses. Let them. After the gluttonous Life Through Bombardment - a box-set of every Eluvium LP ever released – made a lengthy case for how predictable Cooper’s brand of ambience can become when split into sonic shades, Similes is a well-timed second coming that spotlights his craft in an exciting new direction. A brilliant document from an artist who lives between ambiguity and transparency, Similes brings out the best of both realms.