I Like Volcano Choir
I’ve posted so much electronic shit recently you could be forgiven for thinking I’m slowly falling into my own Tron-like alternate reality, but I swear to you, there is still an organic soul hidden under all these circuit boards. In fact, a little bit of flesh surfaced this week when I started to get into Volcano Choir, the joint project of Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon and folk heroes Collections of Colonies of Bees. Their debut album, Unmap, was conceived a few years ago but only dropped on Jagjaguwar last September. The release met with largely positive reviews and subsequently fell into my ears provoking a similarly happy response.
At times enchanting, at others a little confusing and piecemeal, Unmap is a diverse instrumental collage delicately augmented by Vernon’s falsetto vocals. Conjuring an atmosphere reminiscent of a wounded Sufjan Stevens, although perhaps a little less epic, there’s a distinctly tidal feel to the record as a constant pastiche of styles and instruments celestially dissolve in and out of earshot. ‘Island, IS’, ‘Still’ (which features the same vocals as ‘Woods’ from Bon Iver’s Blood Bank EP) and ‘Husks and Shells’ are all beautiful tracks which plunge me into a euphoric stupor, but ‘Seeplymouth’ vividly stands out as the undoubted highlight and for your enjoyment, I’ve attached it below. This is music that makes me smile.
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