Album Review: Grouper - The Man Who Died In His Boat

29 January 2013 | 2:08 pm | Sky Kirkham

This may be Harris’ most accessible release to date.

Composed of songs written at the same time as her breakout album, 2008's Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill, Liz Harris' new album revisits that same world of dreamy melancholy, shedding the extended drone pieces of her more recent releases.

This may be Harris' most accessible release to date. There's still the same distant quality, the same haunting beauty, but occasionally, on the likes of Living Room or Towers, the tracks feel almost like traditional folk. The Man Who Died In His Boat manages to do this without losing the qualities that make Grouper so unique; static provides an underlying foundation, texturing the music, or reverb sits heavily on the vocals stretching them out and pushing them away.

On an album so defined by texture, by slow gentle movement, structure is key and it's been done perfectly here. The music expands and contracts, pulling the listener along and letting them float, carried away by the sounds, until at about the mid-point Vanishing Point steps in. Here the vocals are stripped away. The relaxing tones are dropped and replaced by sharp, discomforting echoes, the vivid contrast a shock that forces reengagement, before the title track steps in with a warmth that drags you back under.

Harris' music exists for the softly-lit corners; flickering sounds match the uneven light of candles on exposed bricks and gentle, pulsing bass drones under the main melodies, warmly enveloping the listener. All the while Harris' voice floats, ethereal and largely incomprehensible yet drenched in emotion and all the elements that could've held the audience at arm's length instead pull them close and make for a deeply intimate listening experience.

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