Our Own Somewhere – Wherever You Go

Our Own Somewhere consists solely of Chris Boehk, an Austin resident who can’t keep from making music. In addition to releasing music under the Our Own Somewhere name, Mr. Boehk plays in proper bands such as Search for Saturnalia (drums), We Talked About Murder (bass), and Beta Valentine (drums again). Wherever You Go, his most recent solo release, doesn’t especially show off the chops he’s picked up with those other outings, but perhaps that’s the point.

The four songs on Wherever You Go showcase his simple approach to songwriting. The winsome appeal of these tracks derives in part from the unadorned nature of the music. The standard guitar-bass-drums lineup, coupled with the melancholy J. Mascis-like vocals, doesn’t ever try to be more than it is. Although recorded in a “proper studio at maximum volume,” according to the label, you wouldn’t really guess that about it. For the most part, these songs would still convey well if performed unplugged.

There seems to be a consistent message here, judging by the song titles: “If You’re Going to Go, You’d Better Leave Now,” “Everywhere You Go,” “If You Go, Take Me With You,” and “Wherever You Go.” The third track, in 3/4 time, swings a little more than the others but still hints at the themes of disappointment and regret that crop up repeatedly: “We are here / We are one / Forget all your lies.” In contrast, “If You’re Going to Go, You’d Better Leave Now” sounds peppy and almost poppy; the rapid strumming of the guitar recalls Johnny Marr.

Wedged between these two songs is “Everywhere You Go.” The simple guitar lines – the chords are reserved for the choruses – establish the song’s mood, harking back to the understated but effective modus operandi of the Coachmen and Backyard-era Miracle Legion. Finishing out the album on a slower note, the title track sounds more like Red House Painters or Idaho than do the other tracks – rhythmically, especially, but also in terms of the personal and maybe confessional lyrics. The song builds to a loud ending that shows off a little of the “proper studio at maximum volume” mentioned earlier.

Mr. Boehk owns and runs the Has Anyone Ever Told You? label (featuring a small stable of bands in addition to Our Own Somewhere) with his wife. With all the songs on this release centering on people leaving and going away, let’s hope this album isn’t too personal and specific, as we’d hate to lose an indie label that’s actively putting out lots of otherwise-unheard music.

Wrecking Crew – 1987-1991

For those of you that are regular readers, you know when I receive a hardcore album, I try to be objective and find the good things. But there is nothing left to do in hardcore but rehash old ideas. Why listen to some new band playing what someone else played (better) 15 years ago or more? Case in point: Wrecking Crew.

1987-1991 is exactly what it sounds like: a retrospective release of a classic band. Retrospectives like this are pretty cool in general, but when it comes from Bridge Nine, you know its a cut above the rest.
The one thing about this collection that pisses me off is that it contains everything except the band’s Balance of Terror album and some compilation tracks. The reason they aren’t included? Roadrunner owns the rights and they are busy releasing quality albums by Nightwish.
Other than that, this is 66 minutes of exellent Boston hardcore. This includes the band’s 1988 and 1990 demos, a few comp tracks, live tracks, and a re-recording of “Why Must They?”.

Musically, Wrecking Crew was one of the most intense bands of the day. The band mixed classic New York hardcore sounds with some fast, thrashy crossover stuff. Not metalcore by any means, but there is enough metal appeal to keep things interesting.

The production, as you can imagine, isn’t super glossy and clear, partially because the recordings are old, and partially because it isn’t supposed to be. With that in mind, the sound is pretty dang good. Parts of the collection were recorded in different places at different times, so the production values vary, but none of them are offending or anything. If you are an old-school enthusiast, chances are you already have your hands on a lot of this material. However, the packaging and liner notes are killer, and I highly recommend picking this up. Bridge Nine always does it right.

Apple of Discord – Revenge & Regret EP

It’s good to hear bands that don’t suck. It’s even better to hear bands that don’t suck in a genre you like. It’s best when you hear bands that don’t suck in a genre you like that’s also been pegged as ‘dying’.

Apple of Discord accomplishes those three points by not sucking at playing new-wave emo/emotional rock/post-grunge (take your pick). These guys have a firm grasp on their sound due to their chemistry tighter than a miser’s fist on a dollar. The guitars have the soft melodic verse/harsh sludgy chorus pattern down to a T. And with a vocalist vaguely akin to Claudio from Coheed and Cambria, it’s like having Brand New and Coheed in a room together with a lot of time on their hands to get the timing down perfectly on the songs.

I say timing because punchy bass lines, rhythmically exciting drumwork, and a solid rhythm guitarist make these songs tick like clockwork. Due mostly to the superb rhythm these guys produce, the old formula works, as songs like “Nothing Ever Stays Buried” and “Last Breath” speed by in a head-bobbing, fist-raising fervor. Not exactly mosh-inducing material, but there are some sections (especially in “Last Breath”) that could elicit some dangerously flailing movement. The mosh-mongering really begins with “It Must Be Nice to Hope for the Things You Wish to Want,” which features a killer bass riff to propel the song. All of the band’s best elements come together here: timing, singing, playing, and writing; there’s even an unexpected mood shift.

To cap off the entire EP is the phenomenal “Hell Holds No Power Over Me Because I Can’t Dream of Heaven” (how’s that for an emo song name?). From the simple yet interesting drum intro to the slamming guitars to vague, intensely emotional lyrics to the surprising clarity of the vocal performance, this song has everything an emo kid could dream of in a song, if not heaven.

Here’s the final word on this: emo kids will love this. This won’t convert any who hate emo, but that’s not the focus here. This is good new-wave/emo for those people like me who had become jaded into thinking good music in the style exists purely in theory.

Patrick Wolf – Wind in the Wires

Patrick Wolf is no wunderkind on par with Mozart, mind you, despite what his press materials say. Wolf may have begun dabbling in composition at age 11 in his South London bedroom with a violin, organ, and four-track tape recorder, but did he compose his first aria at age five? No way, that was Mozart, man! Of course, Mozart never built his own Theremin, which wasn’t invented until 1919. Sucks for Mozart. Cool for Patrick Wolf, and by proxy, cool for everyone else lucky enough to hear this tousled-haired South Londoner’s musical output, which by the way rules the (prep) school.

Wind in the Wires is Wolf’s second offering from Tomlab Records, and it faithfully picks up where Lycanthropy left off. Wolf’s traditional folk songs are underpinned by digital dalliances and held together with a stapling of drum machine rigor. At 21, he has the raconteur’s wit of a younger Nick Cave still buoyed by the weightlessness of possibility.

Vocally, Wolf doesn’t floor you, neither does he drill holes in your skull. His plainly plaintive voice can at times swell with emotion or at others growl with furious discontent. Violin and piano both play prominent roles in Wind in the Wires, giving the album that classical bent that only digital chirping and electronic swooshes can artfully pull back into the realm of modernity.

“The Libertine” unravels with a storybook flourish, teetering on gypsy strings. Wolf impassions, “All our heroes lack any conviction / They shout through the bars of cliché and addiction.” The title track emerges through a gust of piano droplets and a digital haze, while criminal horns lurk insidiously beneath the mix. Murk and menace are expertly ballasted by Wolf’s green enthusiasm, which sounds more confusing than it is. But it isn’t trite or tossed off either. Our boy takes the portent of a Connor Oberst and marries it with a heavy dose of classicism bordering on the Victorian.

British heath hopping is abound in “The Railway House,” with its heavy stomp, handclaps, and layered vocal F/X. Wolf’s voice comes bristling off the moor: “Let’s paint these walls and pull up the weeds / And cast our fevers in stone.” “Apparition” takes a page from labelmates the Books with its stop-start string strums and found-sound backgrounds. Fantastic.

And just when you think that you have Patrick Wolf pigeonholed as a British electro-Devandra Banhart, he pulls an ace out of his sleeve with “The Gypsy King.” Bird chirps and female backing vocals whisk willfully along, and Patrick bleats and “Woops!” with youthful exuberance. And then the air is let out of the balloon, marvelously segueing into “This Weather,” a blurry tune that comes into focus around the two-minute mark, punctuated with an angry stomp and Wolf growling about “some dark fortunes circling me.”

Wolf eschews the British schoolboy façade again in “Tristan,” where, as the titular Arthurian character, he barks and moans such epitaphs as, “I’m fucked! And I’m fucking too!” And this is what sets Wolf apart from other wunderkind: his ability to take a crass word, or for that matter a crass world, and dress it up in a cavalier’s clothes.

Hood – Outside Closer

Hood’s music has always been loaded with imagery. For me, that image has always been of an ancient sundial on a cold day, slowly decaying under a green blanket of mossy lichens, touched gently by those rays of sunlight which manage to penetrate the dense forested ceiling above. The band’s latest album, Outside Closer, fits perfectly into this image. One of the most amazing things about Hood’s music is that it exudes cold, frigid air and green life simultaneously. This juxtaposition parallels another; Hood plays lush indie rock tinged with obviously synthetic computer manipulations, and despite this apparent clash, the end result manages to be alternately vital and mechanical.

“Any Hopeful Thoughts” is a perfect example of this dualistic nature. Chilly guitar plucks resonate crisply beneath Chris Hood’s warm vocals as grating mechanical scratches manage to drift in the distance without disrupting the peaceful, almost meditative vibe of the song. “Any Hopeful Thoughts” manages crescendo and catharsis perfectly; a quite, shifty beginning segues effortlessly into a full-blown march, while Chris Hood gets lost in the confusion and ultimately is outshined by a spectacular violin line later on. “End of One Train Working” continues the expansive, meditative atmosphere of “Any Hopeful Thoughts.” Chris Hood ruminates dreamily above more guitar pluckery and some creepy handclaps. “Winter 72” is another six-minute-plus dirge that works discordant, atonal bleeps and scratches into the mixture. “The Negatives” is the most straightforward pop song on the album, yet it still has a surprising complexity; layers upon layers of sound interweave to form an ostensibly simple and totally compelling melody.

But the highlight of the album is its second half. “The Lost You” kicks off perhaps the finest four songs that Hood has written yet. It sounds as if the band recorded a song, then chopped it up and used it to compose the melody of “The Lost You.” The beat is composed of slices of Chris Hood’s vocals spliced with backwards guitar loops and surgically reconstructed drum patterns. The result is absolutely revelatory, an idea that turns traditional songwriting on its head entirely. “Still Rain Fell,” “L. Fading Hills,” and “This is Forever” continue the chilly vivacity of the first half of the album, but with much better execution. “Still Rain Fell” is a surreal trip across the British countryside, replete with crisp guitars, smooth drums, and a particularly inspired vocalist. “L. Fading Hills” further pushes the percussion to center stage, putting the rest of the band in a backseat to the propulsive drums.

“This is Forever” is the perfect microcosm for Outside Closer as a whole; expansive, dreamy, and surreal, the song continues for over seven minutes without repeating itself to excess. Chris Hood again manages to get lost somewhere in the fray, overcome by the frosty splendor of the instrumentation. Indeed, Hood’s particular brand of indie rock is easily recognizable and refreshingly unique, and despite a few faults along the way, Outside Closer is an excellent album, if not totally fulfilling of its promise. If Hood can refine its songwriting just a little further, the band could produce an album with the unmistakable innovation and immortal beauty of Radiohead’s Kid A. Until then, I’m satisfied with playing Outside Closer’s more transcendent moments over and over.

UNIVAC – S/T EP

Add UNIVAC to the growing list of bands (Kraftwerk, Devo, Clinic) who’ve made no attempt to hide their penchant for technology. Named after the Universal Automatic Computer, an eight-ton piece of (heavy) metal used to predict the 1952 presidential election, this Los Angeles quartet makes 90s-era modern rock with an industrial twist. Think Soundgarden with more Pro Tools.

While modern rock has been oft-maligned for its use of brainless, crunchy guitars and lyrics involving bodily functions (I mean, no offense to Nirvana or STP, but could any of their songs not mention scratching an itch?), UNIVAC does find some room to maneuver amidst the genre’s limitations. Each of the four tracks on this self-titled EP incorporates a slightly different style, starting with the pulsing “Crossing Guard” — a murky homage to REM’s “Pop Song 89″ — and ending with the Robert Wyatt-meets-OK Computer-type ballad, “Walking Backwards.” The only true dud is probably “Liar,” which grinds along at such a slow pace that I was forced to check both my watch and my pulse. Never a good sign.

So, while UNIVAC may have the angle, the polish, and the LA connections to make it big, its songs are still a work in progress, an exercise in potential. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, though. As any of the band’s technologically inclined musical ancestors might attest, “potential” energy converts quite readily into “kinetic” success. All you need is a little acceleration.

Del Cielo – Us vs. Them

Del Cielo is a female rock trio on Lovitt Records, a label largely known for its tightly knit band roster. So it’s not surprising that the artwork design is credited to Keely Davis of longtime Lovitt act Engine Down. Del Cielo’s Us vs. Them has plenty of charged riff rock, with flashy guitar and a solid rhythm section. Unfortunately, this full-length effort constantly fails in the field of vocals, where Andrea Lisi’s feminine voice doesn’t quite complement the brawn of the music.

As previously mentioned, the singing on Us vs. Them is the biggest issue. There are truly rocking songs like “Three More” and “Second Chance to Think” that become tainted by the singing. Admittedly, I’m not a fan of most female vocalists, but ones who rock posses empowered and soaring voices (Maura Davis of Denali). Lisi’s vocals are quivering and girly, ultimately sounding unstable and weak. The vocals might fit better alongside adult contemporary music, but not gritty indie rock. Vocals are very loud in the mix, and guitar amplification is reduced to a friendly volume, but this production effort painfully exposes how unfitting the vocals are. Lisi’s voice is reminiscent of something like an off-key Sarah McLachlan, so naturally the more you listen to her, the less you want to.

Now, don’t get the completely wrong impression; this isn’t entirely a bad listen. The music is often upbeat, sometimes sounding like a peppier version of Nirvana. The band’s musicianship itself is tight – just listen to the guitar leads at the end of “Scream.” Furthermore, consider the whole gamut of clean chord runs, fiery distorted leads, and heavy, palm-muted rhythms that are covered on “Too Scared.” Lisi is a very fluent guitar player, and as the group’s only six-string performer, she does a damn fine job.

If the band had a more tolerable singer, I could enjoy Del Cielo’s interesting brand of indie rock. However, the music doesn’t make up enough for the distracting vocals. If you’re an extremely limited girl-rock enthusiast like myself, avoid the hangups of Us vs. Them and look to Denali’s The Instinct instead.

Caribou – The Milk of Human Kindness

I don’t keep up with the bumper crop of laptop heroes putting out music that I hear about in the music press. I’m now sure that some of it must be fantastic stuff, though, and here’s why: I find it hard to believe that I stumbled upon the only really good release in the genre – Caribou’s The Milk of Human Kindness, and I love this album.

Caribou consists of Dan Snaith. He recorded under the name Manitoba for a few releases, and now he goes by Caribou (all because of a seemingly ridiculous lawsuit brought by the Dictators’ Handsome Dick Manitoba). Manitoba (the band) received much positive critical attention during its existence, and with the name change comes a slightly different approach to the music for Snaith. Manitoba’s Up in Flames hewed to “dream pop” or “bliss pop,” whereas Caribou touches on the same but then expands upon it.

The whole release feels thoughtful and thought-out, sophisticated without being showy, and organic where it could have been coldly electronic. There’s no mistaking the input of the electronics in the making of the record, but they don’t dominate the sound. The Milk of Human Kindness veers from being spare to being wide-open, and does it with grace.

For instance, “Hello Hammerheads” quietly exhibits an acoustic guitar and vocals, with minimal percussion and bass. It could almost be a Beach Boys song. Contrast that with, say, “Hands First” – which sounds like an Oneida outtake – or “A Final Warning,” which can hypnotize and transport you with its subtle, quiet energy and Mercury Rev-like backing guitar washes. (By the way, supposedly Snaith reworked a Mercury Rev song on the last Manitoba album.) It’s a beautiful song whose cinematic sweep could easily entice some film producer to incorporate it into a soundtrack. At times, “A Final Warning” recalls the quieter moods you find on Bright’s self-titled album of 1996 – particularly their brilliant songs “The Res” and “Point.”

Caribou drops a number of short cuts onto The Milk of Human Kindness. Maybe they’re designed to break up the album’s flow a little, or maybe they serve to introduce the cuts following them. “Lord Leopard,” for instance, spends 1:37 in a syncopated, almost hip-hop space. The song is followed by “Bees,” which begins with a similar vibe. “Drumheller” is a subdued introduction to the also-subdued “Pelican Narrows.” However, both “Lord Leopard” and “Drumheller” could easily have been full-blown, longer tracks on their own.

Album opener “Yeti” catches Caribou at its most psychedelic. Like much of the album, it requires close attention to catch all of the instrumentation and layering. The vocals surface here and there, imparting a surreal tale of some kind. I wonder whether the drums are sampled or whether they were recorded for this song. They work really well here in matching the feel of the song, which is a recurring facet of the Caribou sound.

The closing track, “Barnowl,” is available also as a separate release. It sounds a lot like Manitoba, and it will have an instant appeal for anyone who liked Up in Flames. It also packs a surprise for fans of early Medicine, as it features a sample that I’m 99% sure is the opening of Medicine’s Shot Forth Self Living. It’s not at all surprising that this would be the case, though, as much of early Medicine’s approach to cacophony-coupled-with-sweetness lives on in outfits like Caribou.

Because the cuts on The Milk of Human Kindness cover such a range of approaches and styles (dream poppy, a little noisy, pastoral, elemental-funkish, and so on), it can be difficult to describe the album as a whole. Compounding the problem is that any track might end up taking you in an unexpected direction or incorporate seemingly incongruous instrumentation (I don’t remember hearing sleigh bells like those on “Brahminy Kite” since since Polvo’s Exploded Drawing). But each song on The Milk of Human Kindness, and the album as a whole, epitomizes a kind of sonic gestalt that makes it all work according to some internal logic. I bet that The Milk of Human Kindness will appear on my and others’ “best of 2005” lists.

Shipping News – Flies the Fields

It’s been four long years since the last Shipping News record proper — the brilliant Very Soon and in Pleasant Company — but from the first notes of Flies the Fields, it’s apparent Louisville’s flagship post-rock group is in no rush to revisit the graves of old, dusty ghosts. The record begins not with the tightly wound, barbed-wire guitar/bass/drum assault to which listeners were first introduced on 1997’s Save Everything or the rapturous, hushed elegies that punctuated 2001’s Very Soon. It instead begins with the gently fluttering heartbeat of Kyle Crabtree’s kick drum and a rumbling bass-pulse to match, a bridge that slowly and carefully expands with the help of spare guitar chords. Only half of the way into “Axons and Dendrites” do the proceedings begin to really boil and then only in anticipated degrees. The track’s an album-opener that owes more to Ursa Major-era Eleventh Dream Day than to the dynamic and emotive post-rock/post-punk of RMSN’s pseudo-predecessor, Rodan, and it’s a clear indication of the band’s approach to its latest eight-song outing. Flies the Fields can be an engaging and beautiful record but it’s one that also seems to stand outside the chronology one would draft or expect from Shipping News.

This isn’t to say the record is without moments that will remind longtime fans of why they fell in love with the group in the first place. The instrumental “Louven,” all swaying guitars and pacing bass-lines, weaves together the somber reflections of both “A True Lover’s Knot” and Rodan’s “Bible Silver Corner” into something that remains both fresh and familiar. Jason Noble’s fragile narration and singing on “It’s Not too Late” echoes his effecting delivery on Very Soon’s “Actual Blood.” The found sounds and guitar asides in the background of “Paper Lanterns (Zero Return)” — a stand-out from 2003’s experiment/LP Three/Four — would be right at home on Save Everything. The record’s greatest moments, though, are ones that seem to exist slightly outside the context presented by the group’s recent outings.

“(Morays or) Demon,” the record’s third track, begins with a crunching, palm-muted guitar line straight out of The Jesus Lizard’s “I Can Learn” and cracks up the tension level to the point where the resulting explosions are not just releases but foregone conclusions. In the track’s closing minute, after the interwoven guitar and bass lines give way to a refrain of choppy power-chords, Noble repeatedly barks “Knocked down! Knocked down! Knocked down!” with a venom that he hasn’t show since his Rodan days. In the sludgy but strangely inviting dirge “Untitled w/ Drums,” it’s Crabtree who steals the show, strumming a loose and distorted electric guitar as he softly duets with Pit Er Pat’s Fay Davis Jeffers.

The proceedings, though, are not without occasionally lesser moments and that’s something that fans of Save Everything and Very Soon may be surprised to hear. For the first time, the group is appearing as a quartet and not a trio, having added The For Carnation alum/Slint touring bassist Todd Cook and shifted Noble to guitar to complement Jeff Mueller. The result is surprising, at times, for what it doesn’t seem to bring to the equation. While Mueller and Noble seemed to work the dual-guitar approach to maximum effect with Rodan, on Flies the Fields it seems they aren’t doing much together they haven’t proven they can do on their own. On tracks like “Louven,” the two-guitar approach adds a warmth and dimension that keeps the song’s verses constantly flowing and developing, but that’s something that Mueller nailed with the use of digital delay on Very Soon. And, while Cook’s delivery seemed the perfect balance to Brian McMahan on records like The For Carnation, it doesn’t do as much here. Above and beyond the startling chemistry exhibited between Crabtree, Mueller, and Noble on past records, Noble’s bass simply has a quality in the Shipping News formula that Cook lacks — a kind of sensuousness and sense of rhythm that he might have inherited from his occasionally referenced interests in Prince and 80s hip-hop. (Insert King G and The J Crew reference here.)

Then there’s Crabtree. The former Eleven Eleven anchor is arguably of the most inventive and hard-hitting indie-rock drummers out there — if you need further evidence, see him live — but he just doesn’t seem entirely involved in Flies the Fields. It’s only on “The Human Face,” the only track where Noble appears on bass and Cook shifts to second-guitar, that Crabtree and much of the rest of the band seem to muster the spark of their former selves. Though it starts with a casual, borderline pensive intro, the track is a vicious barn-burner whose core revolves a pummeling rhythm section, Mueller’s song-speak narration, grimy guitars, and stop-start refrains. (Shellac bassist, engineer extraordinaire, and Rusty namesake Bob Weston also contributes some backing vocals, according to the liner notes.)

Maybe it’s heightened expectations from Very Soon or a sense of anticipation exaggerated by the length of time between full-length records, and maybe it’s just that Flies the Fields is in the unfortunate position of following a couple records that could serve as the high-water mark for no small number of acts. It’s tough to say, really, and even tougher to pick apart a record by a group of musicians who so consistently deliver and rise above the bar. The record, all in all, is a great one, with a few songs that stand among Shipping News’ strongest, but ultimately, for some, it may feel like a victim of the band’s own brilliance and past luminousness. Let’s be honest, though — even a good record from RMSN could knock over the most sterling offering from lesser bands and, with Flies the Fields, Shipping News does continue to prove it’s a demon that cannot be knocked down.

Aarktica – Bleeding Light

New York City is a place of frantic movement, filled with masses of people constantly moving. It’s known as the city that never sleeps. It has some of the highest buildings in the world and is one of the densest cities. It’s big, it’s loud, and it relishes those stereotypes. And yet, somehow, Jon DeRosa, the man behind Aarktica, has managed to find its subtleties, softness, darkness, and simplicity in the electro-ambient tones of Bleeding Light.

New Yorker DeRosa has refined his songwriting and guitar work through a handful of projects, including pop and alt-country/folk. But his most enigmatic work is the curious and soothing Aarktica, which is all about experimentation and soundscapes. On his latest, he retreats a bit from the more pop structures of 2003’s Pure Tone Audiometry and mixes electronic ambience with lush, nearly shoegazing textures and hints of free jazz, breaking his impressive guitar work into its most basic cores and adding horns and strings to the primarily electronic foundation of Bleeding Light.

Curious tape looping and moody vocals drift through the opening “Depression Modern,” which floats darkly into the more breathtaking and lifting “OJ Guide.” This track, which exalts Times Square’s light architect, is brilliant, with fuzzed-out electronic flourishes taking the forefront with DeRosa’s pretty vocals, all the while some starkly lovely guitars play a gentle swath.. The gorgeous jazzy opening of “A Shadow Knife (Draws the Bleeding Light)” flows into more upbeat rhythms that provide a structure for the soft drone and vibrant horns. This brilliant instrumental feels nothing like its eight-minute length, and it’s clearly the album’s highlight.

A bit of Pure Tone Audiometry’s more pop-based song structures return to “A Wash a Sea Goodbye it’s Me,” a more flowing track where DeRosa’s singing style – low and mellow – somehow manages to ebb and flow with the rhythm of this mid-tempo song that reminds me of the latest Album Leaf release. My only complaint is that this track would be a perfect album closer, with its building and glorious mix of horns, guitars, and drums that back up the repeated refrain of “goodbye, goodbye” and the odd transition back to soft and ambient works. That transition is the album’s only weak point, as the next track, “Twilight Insecta,” is one of the album’s most ambient track.

Bleeding Light is certainly a more experimental work, and some tracks show off DeRosa’s obviously impeccably structured efforts of unique experimentation, like the oddly cohesive flow behind the unique effects and deconstruction of “Night Fell, Broke Itself” and the curiously cold, ambient “We’re Like Two Drops Separated By a Drowning.” There’s an odd Indian raga sound to the title track that fits remarkably well with DeRosa’s voice, pop rhythm, and subtle synth backing.

More an album of mood and tone than a concept album, Bleeding Light won’t immediately show you its nod to the Big Apple, but with that knowledge, its dreamy and droning pieces reveal a side to the city that DeRosa calls home that most would never know or expect. While on the surface comforting in its subtle drones and electronic flourishes, louder and repeated listenings reveal tremendous experimentation, with unique flourishes of guitars and horns and more that prove DeRosa is a truly tremendous artist pushing the envelope of a unique genre.

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