Yearly Archives: 2011

Arbouretum, The Gathering (Thrill Jockey)

Last week’s edition of the LEO Weekly included my review of the new Arbouretum record, The Gathering:

The last time a rock band cited Carl Jung as a primary influence was probably on The Police’s swan song, Synchronicity; but on Arbouretum’s new record, The Gathering, Dave Heumann has found inspiration in the father of analytic psychology’s posthumously published, hallucinatory “The Red Book.” The lyrics are darkly imagistic and dream-like, and perfectly match Arbouretum’s music, a hybrid of the heavy post-hardcore of Lungfish and the delicate melodic sensibility of 1960s-era British folk rock bands like Pentangle. High points include “The White Bird,” which sets the album’s ominous tone; “Highwayman,” a haunting ballad of reincarnation; and “Song of the Nile,” a sprawling 10-minute epic dealing with gnostic mythology. Heavy bands rarely sing lyrical concerns worth further exploration, but in The Gathering, Arbouretum has successfully turned the stuff of dreams into reality.

Buy it from Thrill Jockey here.

Sidi Touré & Friends, Sahel Folk (Thrill Jockey)

This week’s LEO Weekly includes my review of the new Sidi Touré album Sahel Folk:

Although Sahel Folk is Sidi Touré’s debut for Chicago-based Thrill Jockey records, the Mali-born singer and guitarist is no stranger to the international music scene. In 1976, a young Touré joined the Songhai Stars, one of Mali’s famed “regional orchestras” that frequently toured the western Sahel (the transitional zone between the Sahara Desert and the sub-Saharan savannas of Africa). On Sahel Folk, Touré addresses issues concerning his countrymen on songs like “Adema” (about his country’s continuing modernization), while his guitar playing retains a loose, casual yet melodic feel enhanced by the album’s you-are-there approach — apparently it was recorded in the living room of his sister’s house, over cups of tea, with a maximum of only two takes per song. Sahel Folk’s beautifully hypnotic melodies should provide fans of Ali Farka Touré and Bassekou Kouyate plenty of reasons to love Sidi Touré.

Buy it from Thrill Jockey here.