The Islands - Greetings Ancient Ocean
(Son of Freud)
The strange blend of electronic synth pop, heavy metal guitar solos, drum machine beats, space rock, drone and gentle post rock known as Greetings Ancient Ocean by The Islands has found it's way into my hands. It came by way of a mysterious CDR label I've never heard of based right here in my small-and-virtually-music-scene-less town of New Haven, CT. The insert says Dan Sobo plays guitars, bass, clarinet, preschool, little tikes, csound, synthesizers, and percussion to make this music which is sometimes playful, often epic and atmospheric, and occasionally simple and melancholy. What is rare about this CD is how the shifts in style can come and go with such grace, as if they were intended to be paired together all along. This CD is to the bedroom-ambience-post-rock crowd circa 2002 what Bill Ding's brilliant Trust in God, But Tie Up Your Camel was to the Chicago-centric-post-rock crowd circa 1997.
The Album Leaf via Mogwai exercise, "Color Theory," opens the album. "Winter" escalates a droning wall of guitars towards an ebbing synthesizer/organ driven pop song very reminiscent of a song from The Virgin Suicides soundtrack. "Loride" finds Jon Attwood's (Yellow6) well-charted terrain being retread quite well, with a few flourishes of space and pop tossed in. If the boys of Trans Am mellowed out a bit and recorded with Brian Eno, we'd probably get an albums worth of the second track, "The Great Integrator."
The sense of fun and exploration on Greetings Ancient Ocean is very apparent. The only downside is the production, which is very lo-fi. This isn't necessarily all bad, it just leaves some of the songs sounding a little thin and transparent. Nonetheless, this album is a complete surprise that will retain its hold on my CD player for months.
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