Album Review: Low - Double Negative

Press play and the first thing you'll hear on the new Low album is the equivalent of a digital sandstorm.

Slowly but surely, out of the static and sonic scree comes the voice of Alan Sparhawk, sounding like a ghost trying with all his might to re-engage with the physical world. It's a fascinating way to open an album; a new approach for Low and one that sets the scene for their most experimental and strangely beautiful record to date.

There's a strong David Lynch aesthetic at play across Double Negative. That blend of a sense of foreboding and unease mixed with tender and affecting musical emotiveness. Dancing And Blood continues to ratchet up the tension and usher the listener further into the present. Producer BJ Burton has worked in Bon Iver's studio and you can certainly hear elements of the creative deconstructionist approach to traditional song that has happened within those walls. Mimi Parker takes the lead vocal on Fly and it's a powerful moment, almost backwoods ecclesiastical in the way it billows and urges. The defiance is short lived though as Tempest submerges their voices in grainy, almost all-consuming decay. The clouds part momentarily before the connection is again violently disrupted.

Always Trying To Work It Out is a soulful suffocated pop song while Poor Sucker is unsettling and laced with existential dread. When Dancing And Fire emerges with pristine, clean guitars and an unprocessed vocal from Sparhawk, it sounds positively calming, Parker's voice acting like a tonal echo chamber. "It's not the end, it's just the end of hope," they sing, and it sums up the album's themes of standing up for one's beliefs, the danger of losing optimism and how the negative forces in the world are warning signs to correct things before it's too late.

Low leave us with Disarray, a robotic dance at a death disco and a plea for change; "Before it falls into total disarray, you'll have to learn to live a different way." Double Negative is bold and powerful music, fusing the avant-garde and traditional song with both friction and harmony. It's unnerving, visceral and wholly compelling.