Though it's far from a hard and
fast rule, when an acclaimed artist returns from a "prolonged
silence" (two or more years) their comeback is often bursting at the seams
with ideas. In 2013, Arcade Fire followed up the nostalgic baroque pop of
2010's The Suburbs
with Reflektor's
two discs of humanity-driven disco, Haitian music, garage rock, and dream
pop. Kanye West's reentry into the world after the Taylor Swift debacle
was the 68 minute My
Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy;a mesmerizing blend of hedonistic
excess, prog-rap
experimentation, and Auto-tuned
ruminations on a
failed relationship.Built to Spill made their great leap forward in
the three years between the irrepressibly
tweeThere's Nothing Wrong with Love and the mesmerizing guitar epic,
Perfect From Now On.
In each case, it felt like the artist was making up for lost time. That they had
to get everything off of their chest or they'd be swallowed up by regret.
That same impetus isn't nagging
at Bear in Heaven on
their latest single "Autumn." Rather than being overstuffed after a
two year absence, the opener to their fourth album Time Is Over One Day Old
is remarkably svelte. The Jon Philpot fronted, synth-fed rock outfit's new
method is to strip away layers and "focus on emotional
response," which shows in "Autumn." James Elliott's bass
doesn't perpetually chime on a sunny afternoon; it menacingly chugs away at
midnight. Instead of luxuriating, the synthesizer momentarily shrieks before
falling through a trap door. Jason Nazary punches away at his
drum kit like a boxer trying to overcome a deficit in the final round. Inspired
by his band's performance, Philpot is similarly succinct. He refrains from drawing out syllables
and focuses on the soft "pounding in your chest." "Take it easy,
nice and easy," he calmly advises at the start of the second verse.
There's no pressure to repeat past successes here.
Time Is Over One Day Old drops August 5 on Dead Oceans.
Though last year's soaring LP Repave by Volcano Choir essentially acted as a new Bon Iver effort, it's really been three years since the act Justin Vernon came to fame with has issued anything new. In the run-up to Repave's release in September, Vernon expounded on the silence surrounding Bon Iver, saying "I really have to be in a specific
headspace to even begin to illuminate an idea that would create another
Bon Iver record, and I'm just not there." At the time his words were effectively a death knell, terrifying fans (myself included) that a follow-up to Bon Iver Bon Iver would never come.
Today then is a cause for minor celebration amongst Bon Iver torch-carriers. As previously reported on the blog, Bon Iver is contributing a new effort to the upcoming Zach Braff film Wish I Was Here and today Line of Best Fit points out the song "Heavenly Father" has officially debuted. In terms of sound, it owes at least a bit of rent to Repave closer "Almanac" which was similarly constructed around an electronic figure. That said, the synthesizer in "Almanac" was far more confident and forward-moving than the electro manipulation we hear in "Heavenly Father". The piece hiccups and stutters in shifted pitches as Vernon's familiar ache floats atop. At times invading hi-hats tics make you think "Heavenly Father" could launch into trap territory if given enough time. But the song doesn't have that kind of certainty. Vernon's perpetually wondering if he can ever come to accept a higher power, or so it seems. "I was never sure how much of you I could let in," could be a religious skeptic's call to the Lord or an explanation offered to a former lover why things didn't work out. With "Heavenly Father" Bon Iver show why love and religion aren't the right answer for everyone, they're riddled with far too many questions that can never fully be answered. (You can listen to "Heavenly Father" now through the All Songs Considered Media Player on NPR and look for the Wish I Was Here soundtrack to drop digitally July 15.)
Reading Lia Ices' description
of her third LP Ices, someone could draw the conclusion that the Hudson
Valley artist is a tUnE-yArDs
derivative. A solo artist who trades in "Persian percussion, hip-hop
beats, lo-fi, hi-fi, Pakistani pop, Link Wray, Jason Pierce, gospel, dub,"
practically screams Merrill Garbus' band moniker from the highest rooftop.
Screaming and shouting though are actions reserved for Garbus, whose most indelible tracks
tend to leave her voice ragged. Her vocals aren't a component of the songs, but
the main feature.
Ices' vocals meanwhile tend to
bleed into the background. On captivating first single "Thousand
Eyes" they're indecipherable to a casual listener; buried underneath
fragments of sitar, gingerly strummed guitar, clopping drums, and an ocean of
reverb. If the futuristic tribalism vibe she's trying to conjure isn't clear
from the music, a sharp ear can hear her mention "astronauts" and
"fire" with equal amounts of awe. Ultimately that's what
"Thousand Eyes" is all about, being able to find the magic in
everything from the moss that grows on a stone to the plummeting canyons of
Mars. "For the first time, Lia Ices felt like an inclusive project with
its own identity, not just a name," Ices writes in the aforementioned
press release. With something so warm and inviting, everyone should feel
included.
There's a piece of conventional
folk wisdom which posits "smaller scorpions are more dangerous than the
larger ones," and while the legend has no logical grounding, it's continued
to linger around in our collective conscious. So much so that sagely Indiana Jones doled
out the advice. It's akin to colossal elephants cowering in fear
when confronted by a mouse. They leave “craters” in the ground, but scurry
away upon seeing a tiny white fuzzball. Though these anecdotes seem
disparate, they're part of the larger notion that big things come in small
packages.
Indie-folk singer Angel Olsen's Burn
Your Fire for No Witness is the latest example of this phenomenon. Even at
its most bristly, there's an unmistakable tenderness to Olsen's sophomore LP.
Behind massive walls of fuzz in "Forgiven/Forgotten"
she warbles "I don't know anything, but I love you." Subtract the
jangle and driving percussion, you're left with a romantic equation. Second
single "Hi-Five"
performs a similar concealment; spiky guitars raise hell, barrelhouse piano
trots around, and Olsen dips into the muddy waters of honkytonk. However, it's
the "Tear
in My Beer" Hank Williams variety, where libations won't submerge
a broken heart. Shaky, Olsen demands "all I need is someone out there who
believes" and by her tone it'll never happen. "High and Wild"s
facile chug paves over the maudlin end-road of "your spirit's
disappeared."
Not all of the record goes to such great lengths to hide the high-stakes.
"Stars" immediately crystallizes into a faux-Spoon
groove to request a larger voice. Not to expose any human rights violations,
simply to exhort "we exist." In an instant, you know "White
Fire"s death-blues carries tremendous weight. "Everything is tragic,
it all just falls apart" Olsen whispers from a desolate plain. Calm
summers can't hope to right the sinking ship she's boarded. To Olsen, trying to
find love in such dire straits amounts to "burning your fire for no
witness," a desperate act done in solitude.
Necessity being the mother of
invention, sometimes desperation can be a Godsend. Olsen finds paradise
hiding in between strokes of brushed drums in "Iota." A cynic would
note speculation rules and they'd be right, if not for Olsen citing time. As
much as it ravages, time is an opportunity creator. Elegiac organ in closer
“Windows” stretches time to its extremes. A withered Olsen demands “what's so
wrong with the light?” Hiding in the shadows is no longer working as a
life-choice and she’ll leap out of a window to escape them. The song's final
push, aided by rousing drum fills, relates to the moment in a relationship when
one person realizes it's over. Instead of prolonging the suffering, they cut
ties forever because there are some things time can't heal.
Often this decay can be spotted
from a mile away. You'll constantly think "this can only work for so
long" and soon your fears are confirmed. Burn Your Fire for No Witness occupies
this depressingly predictive realm. In the album's first chorus, Olsen's
admitting "I lost my dream,” wanting an end to come swiftly. Given enough
time a fire will always die out. No amount of knowledge (folksy or otherwise)
can stop that.
