[audio http://www.seewhatyouhear.com/01path.mp3]

The Lord Dog Bird - The Shedding Path

What a way to open an album. I can already sense myself getting into this record, the debut solo album by Wilderness guitarist Colin McCann, in all its four-track humbleness. The album is self-titled and comes out on the 8th of September through Jagjaguwar (or last week if you're in North America), so keep an eye out!

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MySpace? There isn't one!

Photo by anka

i've taken a bit longer than others to get my copy of bon iver's for emma, forever ago, but i think the wait - while largely unjustified - has been well worth it. the album, released earlier this year on jagjaguwar, is a debut masterpiece never to be rushed into, but slowly savored and appreciated. recorded over a period of three months in a hunting cabin in northwestern wisconsin, it has an uncanny ability of absorbing its surroundings with its gentle presence and enduring companionship which grows with the familiarity of each listen. while the first recognizable highlight in the record is the invitingly immediate "skinny love", the song that follows it proves to be a more sustained effort. "the wolves (act I and II)" begins on a measured and almost wary footing, which eventually gathers courage and momentum as justin vernon repeats with increasing conviction "what might have been lost/ don't bother me". it's a refrain that invariably stirs and unsettles, especially when it finds company in the rousing clamor that supports it. but it all comes full circle at the end in what has been an emotionally draining but ultimately fulfilling journey.

mp3: bon iver - the wolves (act I and II)

last year, okkervil river released the stage names, which was one of my favorite albums of 2007. this september, the follow-up to that album the stand-ins will be out, and after the first couple of preview listens, i still feel it pales in comparison to its predecessor. i'll definitely give it a chance to grow on me, but for the time being, here's the awesome album closer from the stage names. i remember the first time i heard it when i nearly choked on my lunch hearing the beach boys' pet sounds classic "sloop john b" creep its way into the rousing finale of this song.

mp3: okkervil river - john allyn smith sails

Inspired by the legions of angst-ridden teens and pre-teens that flock to their cafes every afternoon, Starbucks is releasing an indie themed compilation titled Have You Heard?.

That means no more avant garde jazz or Nora Jones to go with my frappuccino...and sadness.

Check out the track list after the jump as well as the answer to my awesome joke:

How many indie kids does it take to screw in a light bulb?

"Skinny Love" - Bon Iver (2008 Jagjaguwar) For Emma, Forever Ago

1 She & Him – Why Do You Let...
2 Goldfrapp – A&E
3 Grand Archives – Miniature Birds
4 The Rosewood Thieves – Honey...
5 Sera Cahoone – Baker Lake
6 Bon Iver – Skinny Love
7 Fleet Foxes – White Winter Hymnal
8 Over The Rhine – Nothing Is Innocent
9 Thao – Bag Of Hammers
10 Nada Surf – Beautiful Beat
11 Ryan Lindsey - Put Your Trust In Ross
12 Kate Tucker – Faster Than Cars Drive
13 Eagle Seagull – I'm Sorry...
14 Liam Finn – Second Chance
15 Bettye LaVette – You Don't Know...
16 Fink – This Is The Thing

(via The Music Slut)

answer to joke: it's an obscure number, you've probably never heard of it.

Hooray!

I'll take their word for it. One of my favorite songs from Beast Moans - albeit atypical of their sound - is "All Fires". (Beast Moans is one of those albums that I actually own for real. No interlibrary loaning this bugger into my collection.) It also happens to be the only track from the album I can find on YouTube. =\ Enjoy.

You can also download "All Fires" (and "The Freedom") at their record label's website: Swan Lake at Jagjaguwar.

Seu único álbum, For Emma, Forever Ago, foi gravado de forma independente em 2007, durante sua estadia de 4 meses em uma cabana em Wiscosin, e foi re-gravado em 2008 e lançado pelo selo Jagjaguwar. Bon Iver faz o tipo de música ideal para se ouvir durante uma longa viagem, daquelas com clima bem nostálgico, de volta para casa. Indispensável.

Mariana Rezende

Another top quality product of the fertile Vancouver scene, Ladyhawk released its self-titled début on Jagjaguwar back in 2006. Boasting two genuinely great tracks in The Dugout and My Old Jacknife (both of which featured in No Ripcord podcasts last year) Ladyhawk offered a refreshing take on the 'Southern' rock sound with its sinewy guitar riffs and meaty rhythm tracks. Shots takes that formula and runs with it, venturing into some darker terrain along the way. It's a bolder record, which manages to sound mature without sacrificing the band's free-wheeling 'jam session' sound.

The muscular opener I Don't Always Know What You're Saying kicks the record off with a bang. A ramshackle medley of pounding drums and relentless guitars, this mid-tempo rocker sounds so energetic and spontaneous that I wouldn't be surprised if the band had only jammed it out ten minutes prior to nailing it in the studio. The moody Fear is another early highlight, more a paranoid comedown than an alcoholic-fuelled high, but a cracking tune nonetheless. The album's middle third explores a somewhat darker place - just take a look at those song titles (Corpse Paint, Faces of Death) if you don't believe me - but things brighten up again on Shots' final track, the ten minute plus epic Ghost Blues. The band's most ambitious track to date, this three part marathon tips its hat to progressive rock without ever slipping into the realms of self-indulgence. I presume the band recorded it in a relatively sober state, too, because it features the record's finest musicianship by far.

So while Jagjaguwar may well release a below par record in 2008, Shots is not that record. Funnily enough, it's the sound of one of Canada's best new bands. Well, what did you expect? (8/10)

Album review published on NORIPCORD.COM

Dès les premières secondes de ce Secret Wars du trio new-yorkais Oneida, le ton est donné: le groupe vous envoie une structure hautement hypnotique, la batterie martèle pendant que la guitare et le synthé s'occupent de charger le son de riffs acides. Et pourtant, ce n'est encore qu'une faible annonce de ce qui va suivre: parlez d'art rock ou de post-punk si vous voulez, quoiqu'il en soit ce Secret Wars est en réalité un concentré de huit titres qui, pour la plupart, sont des véritables assauts furieux pour lesquels les mots en "ique" s'enchainent: supersoniques, hypnotiques, frénétiques, épileptiques. Sur l'excellent Caesar's Column, le groupe alterne passages instrumentaux où la batterie se fait tribale et puissante alors que les autres instruments nous mettent à terre, et passages chantés tout en crescendo, avec une basse glissante et terriblement groovy. Le groupe se permet aussi de calmer le jeu à deux reprises, avec un Wild Horses très rock'n'roll, voire blues, et cet étrange The Last Act, Every Time acoustique et aux motifs ouvertement psychédéliques; mais ce n'est que pour mieux repartir ensuite. Wild Horses est ainsi suivi du terrassant $50 Tea: vous pensiez que dans le genre frénésie le groupe n'irait pas plus loin que Capt. Bo Dignifies The Allegations With A Response, deux titres plus tôt? L'erreur est flagrante dès les premières secondes du morceau où le clavier ultra speed démarre ce riff, agrémenté par la suite de nombreux motifs acides de guitare, pour finir dans un magma sonore (contredisant le "Don't take away the precious record of the chaos we are in" que l'on entendait sur Caesar's Columns) et finalement dans une dernière minute constituée d'un seul riff répété en boucle, sans laisser le temps de souffler. De même, The Last Act... précède le cinglant et magnifique The Winter Shaker, plus lent mais tout aussi épileptique, constitué d'un bout à l'autre d'une guitare sifflante, lancinante et d'une batterie à nouveau tribale, alors que le chant qui arrive tardivement prend presque la forme d'une complainte. C'est sûrement la plus belle réussite de l'album (avec le cisaillant $50 Tea), car ce morceau démontre la capacité d'Oneida à maintenir son potentiel hypnotique tout en variant les atmosphères et caractères des morceaux: tout en étant beaucoup plus lent et mélancolique que sur les autres morceaux, le groupe y reste captivant, et même le titanesque instrumental final, Changes In The City, soit 14 minutes d'hypnose pure et dure, ne peut pas atteindre ce sommet.

Secret Wars est donc bien un excellent album, tout de même assez varié même si l'ambiance est souvent placée sous le signe d'un accès de frénésie, puisqu'on y trouve aussi bien des morceaux uptempos que des rythmes plus lents, des passages psychédéliques et d'autres plus hypnotiques. Les morceaux sont aussi servis par une production de qualité (notons d'ailleurs que l'hyperactive Samara Lubelski assiste la production sur les cinq premiers titres), même si on ne retrouve quand même pas la même énergie sur la version album de Caesar's Column que sur les lives incroyables du morceau (voir l'extrait de PUNKCAST dans les liens ci-dessous).

Soyons clairs: si vous cherchez un disque pour installer une ambiance lounge dans vos soirée, évitez Secret Wars qui risquerait de faire fuir vos invités (et les voisins avec). De même, si vous n'aviez pas apprécié le morceau Each One Teach One, sachez qu'Oneida joue ici une musique dans le même genre mais poussée globalement sur tout l'album. En revanche, si vous cherchez un punk (ou post-punk, ne jouons pas sur les mots) épileptique et terrassant, vous laissant haletant et ayant pour seules respirations les blancs entre les morceaux, alors jetez vous dessus car vous y trouverez probablement votre bonheur - d'autant que la pochette est réellement splendide.

Oneida - Secret Wars (2003, Jagjaguwar)

1. Treasure Plane
2. Caesar's Column
3. Capt. Bo Dignifies The Allegations With A Response
4. Wild Horses
5. $50 Tea
6. The Last Act, Every Time
7. The Winter Shaker
8. Changes In The City

Myspace: Oneida

Live: Oneida - Caesar's Column

Black Mountain
In the Future
January 22nd 2008
Jagjaguwar

“The witch is on your trail, my lord
Stormy stormy high
You've been dying to be set free
Oh curse those honeyed hands”

I suppose it is important that you know what you are getting into when you unsheathe the sword that is Black Mountain. These Canadians will take you on a magical walk to the wild side whence witches, sprawling blood, and mystic towers doth hale. You can’t really call it prog rock because it is certainly not forward looking. They are steeped in nostalgia, and fully embrace the gravity exerted by their unapologetic tip-of-the-hat to early 70’s rock ‘n roll. That having been said, Black Mountain has put together a great fucking record.

In the Future is heavy. It is iron clad psychedelic rock that has no qualms concerning the use of fantasy to parallel our politically tumultuous reality. In a context such as ours, songs about witches and tyrants do not amount to mere verbiage. Black Mountain speaks of demons but avoids the silliness some find at D&D conventions. They are an entertaining, creative, and highly electrifying band.

-FF

6/9

http://www.blackmountainarmy.com
http://www.myspace.com/blackmountain

Other Music
Druganaut EP- 2005
Black Mountain- 2005
Stormy High EP- 2006

Justin Vernon, the man behind Bon Iver (bawn-e-vaer), released his debut album, For Emma, Forever Ago, in 2007 and it was quickly picked up by Jagjaguwar.  I talked to Justin after his show opening for Elvis Perkins in Dearland in Northampton, MA and he said that there were only about 200 copies of the album made before Jagjaguwar decided it would be better to stop distribution until after a proper publicity tour.  Somehow, spoiled by my pirated MP3s, I missed the official release date, but the album is out now. You can buy it from the Jagjaguwar website here: [Link]

I also suggest you enjoy Justin's shimmering falsetto in concert (he's in the middle of a nationwide tour). Tour dates and streaming songs can be found on his MySpace: [Link]

...and some YouTube:

Flume

Skinny Love

And some MP3s because we all know that's why you're reading this in the first place:

Skinny Love

Re: Stacks

[audio http://www.seewhatyouhear.com/03 Skinny Love.mp3]

This song was recorded during a three-month solo sojourn by Justin Vernon somewhere in the woods of Northwestern Wisconsin. Apart from committing songs to tape, these solitary days were filled with bouts of wood chopping in the onset of winter (the name Bon Iver being inspired by the French for 'good winter'), providing enough space to inspire the introspective aesthetic behind his startling debut, For Emma, Forever Ago.

I must admit I hadn't heard of Bon Iver before the announcement of this year's stellar Primavera Sound line-up the other day, but as I predicted, it has already led to a discovery or two. His beautiful new album has just been released this week and Pitchfork have just put up his very own 'Guest List' feature where he singles out the Bowerbird's 'Olive Hearts' and Panda Bear's 'Ponytail' as favourite songs - more than enough, in my book, to suggest his music might be on my kind of wavelength.

No doubt Vernon's voice will be subject to a series of inevitable comparison (Patrick Watson and TV On The Radio are two that immediately spring to mind) but there is something promising here from the very first listen. Songs like 'Skinny Love' are sounds I look forward to growing into.

MySpace

Black Mountain and Bon Iver have announced tour dates and have slotted a show at Louisville's Headliner's on Friday, March 7, 2008. Both are from record label Jagjaguwar and it has been anticipated they would tour together. The Besnard Lakes (who opened for PB&J at Headliners in November), Okkervil River, and Sunset Rubdown are also a member of this Bloomington, IN based label, so hopefully they will keep sending great music our way.

I really enjoyed Bon Iver's self-released 2007 album For Emma, Forever Ago (set to be re-released 2/19), so I'm really looking forward to their set. I'm not as familiar with Black Mountain, but they will be fresh off the release of their new LP, In The Future (1/21). As far as I can tell, Bon Iver will be opening for Black Mountain, so I recommend getting there early.

Tix are going to be $12 and go on sale Jan 12 (pick'em up at Ear x-tacy)...until then get this show on your calendar and check out these songs:

Black Mountain- Druganaut (from In the Future LP)

Black Mountain- Tyrants (from In the Future LP)

Bon Iver- Skinny Love

Bon Iver- Emma

UPDATE: Check out our review of the show (note: Bon Iver canceled)

Each year I listen to stacks and stacks of albums, looking for the disc that resonates and moves me and becomes a staple in my audio rotation. And each year delivers a good number of good albums, records worthy of remembering and compiling into a year-end list, albums I then share with friends and set aside for revisitation somewhere down the line. But 2007 had something special: A new artist delivering a record so beautiful and devastating that I’ve had it in heavy rotation since this summer. I can’t stop listening, and the record only gains gravity with each listen.

This album--Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago--is the rarest kind of record, a self-released and promoted masterpiece. And it seems, on initial listen, unassuming enough: Most of the songs couple a softly-strummed acoustic guitar with doubled vocals (normally a low melody matched with falsetto). There are occasional exceptions and flourishes (a choir-like introduction, Pet Sounds-like vocal arrangements, and a percussive crash), but, on the whole, this is a hushed and bittersweet record. In fact, if I’d heard this album played overhead in a cafe or record store, I doubt it’d receive much consideration. For Emma, Forever Ago is a record that needs headphones and your attention, maybe a glass of something strong, maybe the lights off too. Think of it like a movie, how some films seem so much better in the theater. There’s a contract between you and the film, something that says, “okay, we’re here together for the next two hours, show me what you’ve got.” This album needs that commitment from you.

But why? I’ll offer a two-song example. Track three, “Skinny Love,” seems simple enough. Here’s a live version you should watch:

So there’s a jangly acoustic guitar and heartbeat-like kick drum and Justin Vernon carrying the verse with falsetto vocals. And, oh yeah, the lyrics aren’t half-bad:

Come on skinny love just last the year
Pour a little salt we were never here
My my my, my my my, my my my
Staring at the sink of blood and crushed veneer

So this goes on for a bit and then--wham--the chorus hits. When, in the verse, Vernon sings “Come on skinny love just last the year,” it feels like a plea, like a hushed begging. But when we enter the chorus, we’re facing something forceful. The vocals here are gritty and growling and remorseful: hope, here, is gone. There’s no use for pleas, here it’s just regret and I told you so’s. This, of course, sets us up for the bridge and outro, which is where the song really starts to hit below the belt. Here the heartbeat kick drum meets a rim-click and the tough questions come up: “Who will love you? Who will fight? Who will fall far behind?” The song, at this point, feels like it’s leading us to a crescendo, to a defining moment--but it doesn’t, it all just falls off. I think the connections between form and content are fairly obvious.

The album follows “Skinny Love” with “The Wolves,” a track that, initially, seems unassuming and sparse. Here the strummed chords seem especially long, and there’s no pulsing drum to push the song along: it’s just a bit of guitar and long, held vocals. “The Wolves” offers a slower build than “Skinny Love,” but when the crescendo starts to hum, it’s amazing. The guitars move to a faster strum and the vocals soar, the highest of which sounds like its pumped through a vocoder (which, written, sounds misplaced and excessive, but, in the song, it’s perfect) and the whole mess of guitars and vocals decays into a crash of drums that seemingly come from nowhere. “What might’ve been lost,” Vernon sings, “Don’t bother me,” but the track offers beauty through creation and destruction: We hear the song evolve and devolve in only minutes, and then, at the end, we’re back at the beginning, hushed chords and slow vocals.

The entire album follows this pattern of soft guitars and vocals sometimes building, sometimes balking. We often relate music to seasons or scenery, but For Emma, Forever Ago seems to transcend this inclination. Sometimes hopeful, sometimes bitter, the record feels like a complete cycle, like it’s creating and feeling through its own course of motion. And it often sounds as if Justin Vernon has created a fully realized catalog of emotion, a cross-section of a moment than conveys so much more than the sum of its lyrics or melodies.

Again, I can only insist that this is the rarest kind of record, one that will likely draw instant comparisons to Iron and Wine’s The Creek Drank The Cradle, a beautiful album that likewise fell from seemingly nowhere. However, where Iron and Wine offer something like tone-poems, Bon Iver deliver what I can best call an audio memory, a small, sonic document of something passed. For Emma, Forever Ago’s strength isn’t in the weigh of its lyrics, but rather the rise and fall of its melodies, the way it can move between the whispered and the soaring in seconds. It’s an album that’s as heartbreaking as it is beautiful, and it surely isn’t part of the standard end-of-year affair: I’ll be listening to this one for years to come.

I can’t recommend it enough.

(A Note: While For Emma, Forever Ago was initially self-released, the Jagjaguwar record label has since--smartly--picked up the disc. The record will officially go on sale 2/19/08. More info at http://www.jagjaguwar.com/onesheet.php?cat=JAG115).

Richard Youngs is one of the most enigmatic and singular of artists.  Earlier this year he played on a bill which included the Finnish freak-folk chanteuse Islaja and American minimal violinist Tony Conrad.  Like sometime collaborator Jandek, Youngs plays live so rarely – I don’t think he had been on stage in many years – but here had the courage to sing unaccompanied in a church, and to do so with a passion that riveted all present to their pews.  Such vision has led him to record some startling avant-electronic albums, such as The Naïve Shaman and River Through Howling Sky, and has now led him to record the most enigmatic and singular of folk-guitar albums. 

The most intriguing aspects of Autumn Response are the prominent double-tracked vocals which feature throughout, singing these bewitching and poetic tales that lure you completely into his world.  As with many songs on here, “I Need The Light” could almost be a traditional folk song, were it not for the two vocal parts which start together and slip so far out of phase by the end they are almost in different time zones.  The lines blur on “Low Bay Of Sky”, a plaintive, emotive lament full of tumbling guitar.  “One Hundred Stranded Horses” sounds like it is sung in the round, adding to the song’s maddening concentricity.  

The captivating epic “Something Like Air” meanders all over the second half of Autumn Responses, sounding almost like a duet, and sounding almost like something that space precluded from fitting onto The Incredible String Band’s Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter.  I don’t think such comparisons are at all unwarranted: Autumn Responses is a classic, and one which is probably destined not to reach the wider audience it deserves.  It is available now from Jagjaguwar.

:: :: ::

Black Mountain is a band that has been receiving a lot of hype lately and I can't really understand why. Highly evocative of previous psychedelic acts, Black Mountain exists in the ether somewhere between neil young and commets on fire, but rarely approaches the quality of either. Released on the Indiana label Jagjaguwar (Julie Dorion, Skygreen Leopards, Onieda) the album fails to match up to some of it's peers, but the album has a few shiners. The track Angel starts off well, with drawn sleepy vocals and a what-you-would-expect country/psych riff, but quickly deteriorates in to a sappy reverby riff, quickly snapping you back in to the realm of average indie rock. A lot of tracks strike me the same way, making the album a long boring trek at points. But alas, all is not lost, like I said the album has a few shiners, like the previously mentioned track, Angel.

If you are looking for psych throw backs, you could do a lot better, just sayin'. Take for instance a band like Howlin' Rain. Fronted by Ethan Miller of Comets On Fire fame, the band sounds sort of like Credence Clearwater Revival incarnate, but with a few more noise freakouts. I saw the guys at this past spring's Folk Yeah festival in Big Sur, California and they even looked like they were from the 70s, sporting dad beards and vintage equipment. Howlin' Rain has released only one self titled album, but it fucking rocks. Long tracks with interesting vocals and lyrics accompanied by a family of country/psych savvy guitars make for a spotless, fun, and interesting album, even if it does sound a ton like CCR. The moral of the story is, if you want 70s rip offs, you can do A LOT better than Black Mountain.

Recommended If You Like: The Seventies, Smoking Weed, Neil Young, Pink Mountaintops, Beards, Hippie Shit

Check out angel off the new Black Mountain, Angel HERE
Buy the new Black Mountain album, In The Future HERE
Check out their really awesome label Jagjaguwar HERE

Check out a track off the howlin' rain S/T, Calling Lightning with a Scythe HERE (highly recommended)
Or just straight up buy the amazing album HERE

Okkervil River
The Stage Names
August 7th, 2007
Jagjaguwar

This blog begins with Neutral Milk Hotel. A great friend of mine named Jim and I used to throw band names around while sitting in his south-side Chicago apartment. Drinking gimlets, we would discuss The Cure while listening to the Rapture. One of our favorite bands to which we’d drink and declare our unfailing fondness was Neutral Milk Hotel. In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is an intrepid and devastatingly beautiful record. But alas it is not the album I am reviewing. But it was a few years ago, while speaking of this album that Jim told me to checkout this band Okkervil River. Instantly I was reminded of such names as Nickle Creek, Rascal Flats, etc. Jim is originally from Ohio, but he is a pretty smart and a very hip person. I knew he was not trying to turn me on to a country band.

Jim explained that I’d love Okkervil River even more than Neutral Milk; that they were similar in many ways. Of course I decided to give a listen. My conclusion was swiftly drawn, “What was he talking about? This band was nothing compared to Neutral Milk Hotel.” Even media sources like Pitchfork had suggested a likeness and superiority to Jeff Magnum’s final work. The comparison was so off in my mind that I unfortunately dropped Okkervil River right then and there. It would be six months before For Real would randomly surface on my media player, making me a believer in both the band and the album Black Sheep Boy.

I had no recollection of exactly who Okkervil were when I heard the song. In fact, when I checked my screen and saw the bands identity I was very surprised. Was I so concerned with what Okkervil River was not, that I overlooked what they were? Perhaps, but with a little time and distance I was converted in a big way. Even though there are in fact tones of country music weaved throughout the synthesizers and horns, Black Sheep Boy is phenomenal, with lyrics that are heavy and compelling; although not quite as startlingly poignant as In The Areoplane Over The Sea. This mix, along with the soulfully erratic and epic vocals of Will Sheff, provokes the listener to search for meaning in artful lyrics. It is emotional pop with tubas and tambourines. The Austin Texas based band’s newest effort The Stage Names continues this tradition.

The palm muted intro to Our Life is Not a Movie or Maybe, before the snare snaps and the piano pounds, revisits the perfect anxiety created at the beginning of For Real from the previous disc. The vocals are very reminiscent of David Bowie hollering, “Hoo-hoo!” The lyrics do not disappoint either. “It's just a house burning, but it’s not haunted. It was your heart hurting, but not for too long kid.” Unless It’s Kicks has a similar effect on my impulse to perform random acts of dancing. In fact this is a very key aspect to the album. It is consistent, with breaks and starts. The tempo is generally up and swinging until the second half of the record.

In comparison with Black Sheep Boy, the music seems more natural and a little less synthesized. Like Get Big off their previous record, Savannah Smiles and A Girl in Port really incorporate country aspects into the song style. While it is not done as effectively as Connor Oberst’s I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning, the country-folk elements of The Stage Names make Okkervil River very easy to approach. A Girl In Port could have been a Grateful Dead tune. I have listened to this record over and over again and I have yet to feel compelled to skip a track.

That having been said, The Stage Names does not have as much guts as Black Sheep Boy. The lyrics are complex and analyzable, but they are not delivered with as much punch. The Stage Names is only more introspective than Black Sheep if you define introspection as a quiet self reflection. Okkervil River is more biographical and utilizes more narrative for this record; it is more linear. It seems as though Black Sheep Boy has more reoccurring themes from song to song, and The Stage Names tells little stories about certain times and certain places and people. Black Sheep Boy is comparatively rawer. I think the refined nature of Okkervil’s new contribution to my record collection mutes my awe. The energy is there at the beginning of the record. But it then leads the listener on a journey inwards and with less tenacity. Black Sheep Boy similarly settles down after its monster track Black, but it does so while gripping my wrist.

Perhaps, after all, what I miss in The Stage Names is the very trait I lovingly embrace in Neutral Milk Hotel, an uncontrived emotional voice. Only in Our Life… can I really hear his spit. However, I don’t want to overstate any disappointment. Okkervil River’s new effort is superb. I’ll listen to it many more times. I would not be surprised if six months from now a random song plays and inspires me to return to this opinion.

6/9

http://www.okkervilriver.com
www.myspace.com/okkervilriver

Other Records
Stars Too Small to Use 1999
Don't Fall in Love with Everyone You See 2002
Down the River of Golden Dreams 2003
Black Sheep Boy 2005

'And You Lied To Me' is one of the good tracks that never made it to Low's 'The Great Destroyer' debacle.  Something the Besnard Lakes seem to have an instinct for is the restrained deployment of excess and it's the secret behind many of the tracks here.  The second half of the album picks up a little urgency and by the time we reach 'Rides The Rails', there's a military, ominous undertow gathering.  The strings move into a higher register, the layers of strings and tambourine start to slide against each other with a little more friction until a fierce, clanging guitar riff interrupts.  Guitars drive the following 'On Bedford And Grand' to an almost military march before the final, shortest track, 'Cedric's War' - a positively bouncy paean to the eponymous Cedric, who "fought for the English".  Magic.

The Jagjaguwar site has one mp3 and I think there's an audio stream of the whole record on there somewhere.  Even more listening on the inevitable MySpace page.

Less and more precisely, The Besnard Lakes are improvisational jams interjected with noise pop that mood swings from the melancholy to the inspirational over 6 minute long trippy opuses while invoking alternately haunting and reflective imagery in the listener.

Phew.

Try saying that five times fast. On second thought, don't. Take a cue from The Besnard Lakes and take your time to get where I'm going, where we're going. Just read it over a few times and let it sink in and then ponder these questions:

Who said that a song should be three minutes long?

Why is everyone in a rush to get somewhere anyway?

Is it about getting there or is it about the journey?

If music for you is about the journey and if you miss the experimental and improvisational side of psychedelic pop rock that was killed dead in the 70's by the over indulgent egos of prog rockers, then The Besnard Lakes are your band.

A personal favorite was "Rides the Rails," a merger of all that was good and not pretentious and cheesy in the Moody Blues (think Ride My See Saw) with all that was experimental and strange in Syd Barrett era Pink Floyd.

Standouts aside, I dug the whole album, and really appreciate what these guys are up to. A short laundry list of things I appreciate: heavily reverbed falsetto male vocals, the tendency to never rush music, a diverse cross section of influences, experimentation, an obvious attention to detail, and tones from yesteryear (rotary/leslie reverb, Hammond organ tones) merged with more modern sounds. In short, I found the album refreshing, challenging, and unique; unique in spite of the obviousness of their influences. It was a joy to listen to yet made me sad, very sad indeed, that I live in Calgary and not Montreal, the epicenter of all that is good in indie music. I can just imagine that The Besnard Lakes would put on a phenomenal live show.

- David Morley

Band
MySpace

JAGJAGUWAR is kind enough to allow you to make that decision for yourself. Click here to stream the February 20 release The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse.

Like what you heard? Download: The Besnard Lakes - And You Lied To Me