File Under?

Balmorhea

Constellations

Western Vinyl CD

Balmorhea’s latest LP, Constellations, is out this February on Western Vinyl. It’s one of the best slowcore releases I’ve heard in quite a while. The trick, as I hear it, in slowcore, is to supply primarily lush soundscapes, but with a palpable pulse that is SLOW – slower than a resting heartbeat, slower than can be comfortably conducted. Against that pulse and amidst the sonic sheen reside motivic and harmonic progressions – just like any other good pop song. The tempo forces the listener to really pay attention, to wait for the material to unfold. At its best, in the music of Low, Labradford, and, yes, Balmorhea, the results are well worth the wait and the effort.

Stay tuned for an excerpt of Constellations closer to the release date.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 6th, 2010 at 1:03 pm and is filed under CD Review, File Under?, experimental. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.