Blessed, Flore Laurentienne, and Ev Bird
Blessed
Circuitous // Flemish Eye
There’s a latin phrase - solvitur ambulando - which translates into “it is solved by walking”. “It’s about the journey, not the destination” is a more cliche but probably less pretentious modern equivalent. Diving into the aptly named Circuitous, you get the sense this concept is something the members of Blessed have figured out. The sophomore full-length release from the Abbotsford art/prog/math/post quartet relishes in each patient step, contemplative, measured, and haunting.
Circuitous is a spiraling and layered journey - one taken the long way round. Pulsing but patient, the record takes its time, alternately exploring sprawling landscapes and hidden corners, never rushing and never settling for easy answers. Playing with staccato percussiveness and twisting time signatures with an approachable grace, it is as mathy and technical as you could hope for, while still managing to remain accessible and inviting. Circuitous stands out for its cohesiveness - somehow unifying the complexity and nuance of its material into a singular whole. It is intricate and self-possessed without ever sliding into gratuitousness, even with tracks like “Provoked” pushing the 8-minute mark. Blessed seem to understand that technical doesn’t mean busy, and give as much love to the spaces between notes as the notes themselves.
There is a surprising and welcome warmth at the heart of Circuitous, despite its forays into industrial percussiveness, clinically crafted harmonies, moments of intentional discord and lyrical themes of isolation. Although at times words like “bleak” and “fearful” come to mind, and there is a decidedly sterile/clinical feel to the album artwork and videos (which centre on a nameless, blank, robot child), Circuitous doesn’t feel cold or distant. Throughout the album, Blessed manages to cultivate an organic element to their sound - a wild and natural greenness emerging in the white sterility of the systems they explore. The sounds are like patterns of neural networks or mycelia fused with the machinery and impersonality of lines of code or circuitry, ultimately creating something new and almost hopeful. Circuitous remains human, compellingly so. Opening track “Redefine” expertly captures this sense with tenderly delicate acoustic guitars, just eerie enough vocal harmonies, and pulsating rhythms, all spiraling and expanding like fractals. The album is tight, restrained, and self-disciplined, but when Blessed do slow down and enter into heavier, fuzzier territory, as on album highlight “Person”, it comes as a welcome release you can’t help but bounce along to. Album closer “Gullotine” provides the synthiest and most anthemic moments of Circuitous, juxtaposed with the most forceful and tormented. Thus the track serves as a microcosm of the whole record - weaving a purposeful thread between connection and fracture.
Sometimes, getting a little bit lost is the best type of journey there is - a joy in the uncertainty of each turn, an expansiveness that comes when you find more questions than answers. You might not have ended up where you thought you would, but you have found something somehow more real and fulfilling. Circuitous provides a meticulous, labyrinthine journey that serves as a refreshing counterbalance to a world obsessed with getting there as quickly as possible.
- Chris Lammiman
Flore Laurentienne
Vol. II // Costume Records and RVNG Intl.
Composer Mathieu David Gagnon has a fascination with water. Using the moniker Flore Laurentienne— which takes its name from an inventory documenting St. Lawrence Valley flora— he has drawn inspiration from the natural splendour of his home province of Québec as the canvas for his resplendently serene music. This project, beginning with 2019’s acclaimed Vol. I, concerns itself with environment, with the vast beauty and tranquillity of nature. To accomplish this, Gagnon orchestrated a fifteen piece string section to enhance his keyboard and synthesiser arrangements, with a notably lo-fi, granular texture contributed by the modest Casio SK-1.
Vol. II sees a continuation of these themes, motifs, and textures, expanding on the sound with new voices. Gagnon deploys an eight piece clarinet section to moving effect on album opener “Voiles,” a soaring rendition of flight, animated by an almost Disney-esque grandeur. With the whirring, unsteady warble of synthesisers in “Fleuve V,” Gagnon turns a different gaze on the notions of ‘natural’ and ‘real’ in his observations of the natural world. These artificial voices shed light on the uncanny in our landscapes, rivers and valleys; the unexplained and bizarre, the uncomfortable. The climax of “Promenade” accomplishes this, too: the sheer drama at its apex rushes over you like a flood, the detuned synthesiser chord at the end subsiding like the tide on an alien planet. All the wonder and confusion, witnessed through the faulty vessels of our human senses, can be overwhelming, too real— reaching a breaking point where it can only be understood through myth, fractured through some lens in the unconscious. In short, some things cannot be thought, only felt.
To take inventory of the St. Lawrence River, Gagnon has not employed a field recorder, a notepad and medium format camera. He instead has mapped the heart of human experience within the setting: the psychic landscape of rushing water, of humming bees and wildflowers, of rocky cliffs and pine trees, of sparrows and worms, and above all the humbleness of humanity in the scope of this great theatre. The view is awe-inspiring, and the sound is as rare as it is all-encompassing. In this way, as a composer, Flore Laurentienne’s work is immaculate, but as a cartographer, transcendent.
- Harman Burns
Ev Bird
Puff Piece // Royal Mountain Records
Now that we've slipped into the colder months, it's easy to find yourself inside more and allow the outside world to pass by. Although now more than ever, it's essential to keep an eye on world events and great Canadian releases. We're back in the driver's seat with a new Canadian release. This time, we've got the new Ev Bird release Puff Piece. Montréal-based artist Ev Bird shares his FADER, Stereogum, Exclaim and Cabbages-tipped EP, Puff Piece, on Royal Mountain Records (Alvvays, Wild Pink). Sonically, the EP is a mix of different vibes and influences ranging from slacker-rock to jazz, from prog to R&B. It's a smorgasbord of genres that Ev moulds into a sound that feels equal parts instantly familiar while refreshingly new. Puff Piece has a tremendously gentle tone throughout the record, with effortless grooves and mellow energy.
Ev Bird introduces a new side to the record on the song "The Ring," featuring guest vocals from Boldy James. "The Ring" stuck out to this reviewer for the layered chorus and big moments. The build-up around 1:45 is highly satisfying and a great bridge into the next vocal section. The verse shared by Boldy James has laid-back energy adding rhythm to the later section of the song, allowing the listener to sample another sonic flavour. This tune has a got rhythm that keeps the listener's foot tapping throughout.
As far as lyrical content on the Puff Piece EP, Ev Bird explores reckoning with mortality, helplessness, melancholy, sorrow and futility with a smile and a wink in his eye. The new music comes as part of a collaborative process with A&R/Producer Noah Rubin, known for his genre-bending work with artists like Flume and Wu-Tang Clan, among others.
Check out the new Ev Bird release Puff Piece for an easy listen that you'll get lost in just as quickly. Still apprehensive but casually optimistic. Excellent record for fans of Mac Demarco, Yellow Days and HOMESHAKE.
- Earl D
