One Mile North - Minor Shadows
(Ba Da Bing!)
Subtlety in music is one of those things that the standard listener may forget that they are looking for, but, when it is found, gives them reason for just celebration. Well-constructed music that relies more upon subtle tones and shifts is always a winning proposition, especially when the basic music is minimalist—it gives the listener the ability to absorb all of the presented music in a focused manner, allowing them to give the proper level of attention to each shift and change in the song's structure. Minor Shadows by 1 Mile North is a fantastic example of this sort of musicianship. The entire album is built around the interaction between Jon Hills and Mark Bajuk as they find a way to effectively weave powerful compositional guitar movements around minimal analogue keyboards. Filling out the duo's sound is a series of bass notes and loops, some of which are only perceptible upon the most attentive listens. Minor Shadows can only be seen as a success in the way that this duo has quietly and intricately assembled such a wonderfully calming and introspective album.
"In 1983 He Loved to Fly" slowly unwinds and builds upon itself over the course of its nine-minute running time, with each moment creating more and of a lulling atmosphere. Reminiscent of some the calmer and more stripped-down portions of the Tarentel discography, the duo never feel any need to rush to get to their musical climax—they let the song take whatever form it needs to in order to achieve the ultimate state of completion. Accented by trumpet, the track takes its time but succeeds in spades once the full structure is revealed. "Life Indoors" follows and starts almost as if it is already in mid-song. The structure and tones are perfect and the album's nascent tone of serenity is allowed to expand. These tracks are only indicative of what is to come on the majority of the album. The setting for each of these songs is deftly established used Hills' deliberate and clean guitar compositions and then accented continually by Bajuk's synthesizers. The sounds are sublime and this general formula is amply supplemented by tastefully included samples and loops. This formula works just as well throughout the entire album and creates a wonderful whole.
A testament to how great Minor Shadows is comes as everything on this record fits together nicely without ever seeming out of place. That holds up until the album's final track, "The Manual." This could be a personal gripe regarding the repetitive use of light highly electronic sounds (a genre I've still yet to grasp), or it could be more legitimate than I realize, but the track has some minor elements that don't coherently fit in with the other tracks. That non-unity is a fleeting issue that comes and goes within portions of the song—it's far from being a condemnation of the entire track.
Minor Shadows came to me from out of the blue and knocked me out with just how good it is. It has been a little while since have been so entranced with an album I knew absolutely nothing about before hitting play. Track this record down and give it a chance—I think it will do the same for you.
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