| One Way, It's Every Way is a Technicolor miasma of tightly coiled synth washes and burbles, brimming with finger-tapping rhythms and ripe, multi-layered harmonies, all of which is bathed in the warm hum and crackle of homemade production. Thought of by its creators as an ode to death, there is none of the prickly distortion and despondent moods that one might expect, but bold, chugging rhythms and guitars chiming sonorously amongst robust fluctuations of sound. The sluggish, melodic electronica of Clue To Kalo's past presently serves as a cozy mattress against which plush psychedelic orchestrations toss and turn, twisting and flanging into jittery vibrations that slowly descend into complex phase patterns. The splintering energy of the rambling Seconds When It's Minutes, with its incongruous blend of insistent pulses and flickers and rainbow-colored synth glissandos, is a pattern much repeated in successive pieces. The result is an intriguing brew of thick textures jibing into a florid collection of sonic patchworks. The qualm to be picked here, however, is that Kalo often goes overboard on the flavoring and marinating of these compositions, making works like Come To Mean A Natural Law and As Tommy Fixes Fights too busy, too sweet, too lacking of any decisive direction. His boyish, gravely voice, which plays a more prevalent part than in past efforts also works to the albums detriment; its indecipherable, lazy whisper adds little emotion to the proceedings and fails to endow moments with coherence, becoming another blurred sound amongst the ailing bushes and branches of this cluttered forest. The latter half of the album warrants more of one's attention. Ignore The Forest Floor picks out a particular melody and stays with it long enough to tend to its development; the chimes, accordion and shimmering bank of flutes accentuate as opposed to trample its distinctive curves and shapes. The Tense Changes, meanwhile, is more of an evolution of the soft, sentimental electronica that Kalo harvested on his previous full-length: sparkling electronics dart magically between frolicsome nursery rhythm melodies and duskier, more introverted fields. The soft trumpet tooting and skipping piano melody of album closer The Older The Young carries this more intimate, sparse approach to expansive, lovely pastures where every note resonates like a bird's voice on the air. One Way, It's Every Way seems an exaltation of the world's density, the development that comes from another's presence and the meaning brought by a finite life. - The Milk Factory |
1XLP/Out Of Print