Monday, November 23, 2009

Album: Jodis - Secret House


Band: Jodis
Album: Secret House
Label: Hydrahead
Year: 2009







Tracklist
01. Ascent
02. Continents
03. Secret House
04. Follow The Dogs
05. Little Beast
06. Waning
07. Slivers
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Jodis, an entirely new outfit involving James Plotkin, Aaron Turner and Tim Wyskida, is a modern exploration of restrained sonic minimalism and tonal/textural density.
What might you expect from a band made up of two parts Khanate, and one part Isis / Grey Machine / House Of Low Culture? Probably nothing as pretty and haunting as this. That's right, we said pretty. We were definitely expecting some crushing slo-mo heaviness, figured if that much of Khanate was involved it would have to be screechy and torturous.
And while Jodis is doomy, it's also moody, and atmospheric, slow and spare, spacious and strangely lovely. Occasionally the guitars rev up and get way louder, and it sounds like the band might explode into some sort of bellowing dirge, but instead, they sprawl into an ominous creep, the guitars shimmery, the notes spaced way out, as much about the decay and overtones as the initial note or the overall melody. The vocals are weary and washed out, reverbed and down in the mix. If anything this reminds us of some classic slowcore, maybe Codeine or Seam, albeit a little more abstract, a little less indie rock, but the same sort of moody drift, the same kind of minimal melody, emotional and dark and haunting and dreamlike.
Surprisingly, the drums are super restrained, in fact, the first few tracks sound almost drumless, minus a few cymbal shimmers, some flares and accents here and there. On "Secret House" the drums are active, flurries of fills all over the kit, but not for bombast, again for texture, almost like playing chords on the drums, there are some harsh vox on "Secret House", and they almost sound out of place, disrupting the strange slow tranquility. But once we move on to the next track, we're back to that gauzy melodic drift, the drums again super skeletal, the guitar drifting in the ether, the vocals choral, almost monk-like, super meditative and ethereal.
And the rest of the record plays out in a similar fashion, long drawn out slow burning epics writ small, the three exploring the space around the notes, finishing off with the gorgeous 9 minute "Slivers", the guitar unfurling a fuzzy blurry drone, the drums more active, a bit tribal, but still muted, and the vocals a falsetto off in the distance, the track, heaving and pulsing and shimmering, before slipping into a more abstract drone and then blinking out.
Some seriously gorgeous stuff, a surprise new favorite for sure, getting lots of play late at night, lights turned low, consciousness at rest, on the cusp of some other plane...

Official Site
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2 Engineers:

Fingolfin said...

What about send via email? can you help me?

Nordsee said...

Sent me an email with your question ;)

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