Sacred Bones Records (label)
08 June 2018 (released)
08 June 2018
The notion of a soundtrack for an imaginary film as a conceit can be wearisome (and some): ‘Non-Diegetic muzak for cloth ears’. However, sometimes it is more than justified. Mental imagery is stimulated and painted to great effect here, languished anguish and bewitching bitching.
The piano sits at the forefront of the tempo, the spinal chord of mood and feeling, Woods’s hush is in no rush to gush like Kate Bush. The overall feel is akin to the incidental music in ‘too close to the knuckle for my liking dystopia-vision’ The Handmaid’s Tale: a bleak oblique peek at the present-future. ‘Inhaler’ is spectral and emotive, the chest tightens as the oxygen is trapped, the lights grow dimmer as life grows thinner ... and breathe.
The ‘Prodigal Dog’ gets a worthy kicking, a riposte to a stray hound found cheating, caught in the act and destined for the perennial doghouse, no going back indoors. This is the cry of the cuckold, this is what it sounds like when gloves fly.
The mostly ghostly ‘Kith’ articulates the skin of kin through thick and thin, the ties that bind and the lies that grind as blood proves thicker than it oughta.
The son of God recites his rites on ‘Jesus Said’: raising questions of faith and identity, redemption and salvation the desired absolution, the beat evocative of Can’s Irmin Schmidt’s motorik hypno-trances on this dialogue with the prophet of gloom.
Spartan and spooky this Celtic siren’s call is a ‘holier than’ vow for existence and resistance.
