General Ratings:
Music: 7
Lyrics: 4
Scope: 5
Consistency: 5
RIYL: Sufjan Stevens, Belle & Sebastian, recent Iron & Wine
Further Listening: Sin Fang Bous, The Twin Atlas, Amiina
Place of Origin: Reykjavik, Iceland
Instrument/Sounds List: Acoustic guitar, piano, multi-tracked vocals, violin/fiddle, harmonica, banjo, lap steel, upright bass, drums, electric guitar, trombone, tambourine, organ, flugelhorn, synthesizer, ukulele, glockenspiel, vibraphone, tape manipulation, ambient sounds (including owl hoots and fireworks).
Mood Tones:
Season: Spring
Weather: Sunny
Time of Day: Afternoon
Song Highlights: I Sing I Swim, Owl Waltz, Arms
Favorite Lyrics:
"Some Nights I swore/
Your mouth/
Was a trap door." (from Owl Waltz)
"Shake my arms, shake my head/
I fell asleep in your cobweb." (from Arms)
"I love the way you say my name/
It sounds different every day." (from Lost Watch)
Other Thoughts:
Seabear began as the home recordings of Sindri Már Sigfússon, who released several records (c.f. I'm Me on Sundays, The Singing Arc EP) before expanding Seabear into a collective (8 people strong as of the writing of this review) and shifting its focus from bare bones, lo-fi recordings to polished, orchestral pop music (and having done so, now has taken the moniker Sin Fang Bous for his solo output, which has come to resemble the poppier side of Animal Collective). One gets the sense that every instrument in their studio space is on the record at least once, and as is probably implied by the swollen instrument list, there's a layering and a fullness of production to nearly every track on the album. In fact, it's in the piecing apart of each melody into its composite parts that the greatest pleasures of this record reside.
Also, here finally is an Icelandic band that can't be described as "glacial." On the contrary, nearly ever song on TGTCUA is sunny and upbeat if not necessarily up tempo. Wistful tones abound. Pretty melodies come cheap. This record, like Virginia, is for lovers. Underneath this veneer though, there's an interesting war being fought between SS's blossoming inner folkie (best exemplified in the song Arms, slightly less so in Seashell) and the weirder, deconstructive impulses that his songwriting was birthed with. Most of the latter is buried toward the end of the album, and approximates a kind of gradual shift in mood that the romantic in me would liken to the setting of the sun.
The Downside:
Music: 7
Lyrics: 4
Scope: 5
Consistency: 5
RIYL: Sufjan Stevens, Belle & Sebastian, recent Iron & Wine
Further Listening: Sin Fang Bous, The Twin Atlas, Amiina
Place of Origin: Reykjavik, Iceland
Instrument/Sounds List: Acoustic guitar, piano, multi-tracked vocals, violin/fiddle, harmonica, banjo, lap steel, upright bass, drums, electric guitar, trombone, tambourine, organ, flugelhorn, synthesizer, ukulele, glockenspiel, vibraphone, tape manipulation, ambient sounds (including owl hoots and fireworks).
Mood Tones:
Season: Spring
Weather: Sunny
Time of Day: Afternoon
Song Highlights: I Sing I Swim, Owl Waltz, Arms
Favorite Lyrics:
"Some Nights I swore/
Your mouth/
Was a trap door." (from Owl Waltz)
"Shake my arms, shake my head/
I fell asleep in your cobweb." (from Arms)
"I love the way you say my name/
It sounds different every day." (from Lost Watch)
Other Thoughts:
Seabear began as the home recordings of Sindri Már Sigfússon, who released several records (c.f. I'm Me on Sundays, The Singing Arc EP) before expanding Seabear into a collective (8 people strong as of the writing of this review) and shifting its focus from bare bones, lo-fi recordings to polished, orchestral pop music (and having done so, now has taken the moniker Sin Fang Bous for his solo output, which has come to resemble the poppier side of Animal Collective). One gets the sense that every instrument in their studio space is on the record at least once, and as is probably implied by the swollen instrument list, there's a layering and a fullness of production to nearly every track on the album. In fact, it's in the piecing apart of each melody into its composite parts that the greatest pleasures of this record reside.
Also, here finally is an Icelandic band that can't be described as "glacial." On the contrary, nearly ever song on TGTCUA is sunny and upbeat if not necessarily up tempo. Wistful tones abound. Pretty melodies come cheap. This record, like Virginia, is for lovers. Underneath this veneer though, there's an interesting war being fought between SS's blossoming inner folkie (best exemplified in the song Arms, slightly less so in Seashell) and the weirder, deconstructive impulses that his songwriting was birthed with. Most of the latter is buried toward the end of the album, and approximates a kind of gradual shift in mood that the romantic in me would liken to the setting of the sun.
The Downside:
As is the case with any album that finds its purpose in baroque layering, the simpler, sparser cuts (like Summer Bird Diamond) tend to come off as half-baked. The instrumental first track feels perfunctory (and I'm a sucker for intrumental openers and closers), especially considering how nice an opener Cat Piano would have been. The lyrics frequently rely on stock images of wild animals and oft-used emotional phrases, but as the record definitely evokes the pastoral, and English isn't Mr. Sigfússon's first language, I'm inclined to let that particular peccadillo slide.
4 comments:
I find it rather funny that a band you quite dislike (Belle & Sebastian) has now appeared twice in RIYL. RIYL: not biconditional.
My distaste for Belle and Sebastian springs wholly from an inability to listen to Stuart Murdoch for more than about 5 minutes at a time. Their music is often quite nice. More importantly, having dated Jeanne now for more than 4 years, I know what they sound like.
Is it your holding that just because I don't like one thing that I can't notice that it resembles in some way something that I do like and make note of the similarity?
I'm just saying that RIYL only seems to run one way. If you like B&S, then Seabar is recommended. If you like Seabear, then B&S isn't necessarily recommended. Likewise for your relating Slow Club to the Decemberists and Architecture in Helsinki, neither of which you like, if I remember correctly. I'm not saying there's anything at all wrong with that. The point of a RIYL tag is to name better known but similar bands and so is only supposed to run one way.
I can't argue with that.
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