Labels: Harlan
Review by: Andy Malcolm
Now this is more typical Sunday afternoon fodder. 37 minutes worth of lovely, mainly acoustic and often instrumental tuneage. I’d prefer it with words on more songs, but hey, it’s good enough as it stands.
You couldn’t ask for a better start, “Opening” is guitar and bass that ooze warmth over a badly tuned radio. I always love tracks with samples of random radio on, there’s an awesome Month of Birthdays track where they play a travel report or something, and it’s perfect. This is rather special too.
It’s pretty difficult to say too much about the rest of the tracks here, though they do mix things up a bit, and it’s not always the basic straight forward folksy acoustic stuff you might be expecting, with tracks like “Spinning” having quite some complexity and interesting guitar sounds. Vocals are fragile and at times whispery, yet can build up to be powerfully sung or harmonised by the two chaps who comprise the band. My favourite track is “I’ll Be Home Wednesday”, with it’s more upbeat melodies and rhythms as well as the wobbly vocals coming across as similar to Vermont (Davey Von Bohlen’s other band) though it does wander off into more abstract jangles and strums at times.
Good stuff, worth checking out if like it done acoustically.