This is a departure from what I’ve been reviewing as of late. No, it isn’t grindcore or anything drastic. The songs are drenched in harmonies and world beat. Rather a strong record from a band I wish I heard about earlier than last week. This is Shearwater’s sixth album, and I have a feeling I’ll be back racking a lot of their catalogue.
The band is a collaboration of members from Okkervil River and Kingfisher. As the cover suggests, this album is about living on an island and struggling with limited surroundings, and an abundance of Nordic themes. This is the soundtrack for a fight with Poseidon.
What pulled me to this album were Jonathan Meiburg’s vocals. How they seem to swell as the music crashes on him for “Black Eyes”, the power he shows on “Corridors” and this great intensity on “Runners of the Sun”. You could picture him singing from the boat on the cover as he drifts out to sea tell you about his life.
Opener “Meridian” and closer “Missing Islands” mirror each other in their haunting swoops of raw emotion. You don’t hear albums like this too often, where the music compliments the vocals so well that you want each song to keep going after it has ended. Plus, the 70-page booklet acts like a travelogue of sorts on this journey.
I have been very impressed with the music I’ve discovered so far, I just hope I keep finding more interesting bands like this. I’m happy bands like this have started to bubble over as of late and more people are taking notice. If you haven’t, you really should.
