Polmo Polpo - Like Hearts Swelling
(Constellation)
Lap-steel guitar, white noise and short wave radio may not be the first things you think of as melodic fodder for a 4/4 dance floor shuffle, but Toronto-based musician Sandro Perri, the one-man band behind Polmo Polpo, does. His disparate mix of cinematic passages and white-hot drones brews up a nicely syrupy stew, with plenty of driving backbeat even though he has quietly thrown out all the nods to Berlin techno that marked his first few 12"s. "Requiem for a Fox," a centerpiece on the record, is a tapestry of elastic patterns. Sheets of metal and empty oil drums lay down a heartbeat rhythm; static and low-level chords creep in. Lap-steel guitar lends a melancholic patina to the mix. Somehow, though, seven minutes into the track we find ourselves sitting on a beach, watching the sunset and listing to acoustic guitars on an AM radio. Perri has a way of adding this blurry sheen to the whole record, turning one sound into another. Backwards-masked guitars turn into high hats, and bass drums propel the whole beautiful mess forward until, of course they drop out completely. Like Hearts Swelling, the last track on the record, centers around a skittery, propulsive violin refrain and longing accordion passages, more deep breaths than beat, that usher the album out in an elegant and quiet way.
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