Auburn Lull Begin Civil Twilight. The initial listen. Starts off with some wombedelic effects, percussion, shards of hushed vocals. He has very much the Pink Floyd in his voice. I wonder if he went to the laser light show for Dark Side of the Moon at the Cranbrook planetarium when he was a child. Sounds as if it might be so. It is gorgeous, mind. It's an amazing start to the record. Stunning. It's all elements layered on top of each other, not much of a song here, it's a bit Spacemen 3 Recurring as well. They are a local band. Well local for me, from Lansing, MI, I am bi-coastal when it comes to the Candian Shield. I spent a few days with several people from Lansing this week. They recounted the woes concerning the lack of any non-transient life in the center of town. A lot of the town has been taken over by government, to its detriment. Wow this is really beautiful. I don't think that Andrew Prinz had anything to do with this, on first track they don't appear to miss him. I am not sure Andrew Prinz is local any longer even though he too is from Michigan. He's a New York now. He allows the other people in the band to talk, uncool. Amazing first song, I am so excited now that the second has almost begun. Auburn Lull is one of the most beautiful bands on earth, if you need music to set the mood for anything worthwhile then they are perfect for the task. As if I would know. But it's genteel and there are not any moments to lessen the allevating effect and yet it is possessed with enough change to ensure it's intense loveliness never becomes waylaid by forays into tedium. Second song now Dub 1, more rampant prettiness, still, it is merely different methods of pushing the air about, a dub bassline, guitar effects and whispered vocals well down in the mix, multi-tracked. Who knows what he's on about. It's chiming effects on top of the vocal line, louder even now, vague and reassuring. A bit like Obama. Now the effects are overwhelming the mix, marvelous. A new front for the finish, it all sepia tinged stills and a robust cosmic hum and a tender beacon of melody in the mist. There hasn't been a lot of developent in the Lull, just a further refinement of what they do. Third song now, Broken Heroes, that's a very Metallica-like title. Guitars multi-tracked but not really playing anything at all, ooo a female voice, a duet, beautiful. This is really really beautiful. It's Michigan circa 1996, every kid, dazzled by Pure Phase has started a space rock band and their greatest dream is opening for Jason Pierce in the Shelter. Astrobrite won that competition, their status most assuredly undeserving. I've never actually seen Auburn Lull live. Do they play live? They is a chant feel to the vocals, they are moved slightly forward, more teutonic. Slowdive crescendo swirls all around, a lightly brushed percussion, the bass thrusts the song forward away from the deepening vortex. Gosh this is lovely. It truly isn't anything like Michigan at all. it could be the economic depression that has gripped that state has buoyed the spirits of the escapists. His Name is Alive offered escaped even in the best of times. But who wants to be in Livonia during the golden age? Who wants to write about he misery and contempt for everyday life that has been sown there instead cast your glance afield to the stars and majestic heights. Song four, an acoustic guitar and guitar effects, can they do anything that isn't gorgeous? It's very similar to the twee electronica that I fall for, it's all built layer upon layer of comforting elements, nothing is constructed in the sense of progression, it is just a series of romantic postcards. His voice back low in the mix, the music an irresolute tone, probably five or fifty guitars on this track, twinkling keyboards, stirring stuff for dreamers for certain. I denigrate Michigan, of course, but I suddenly realized when I was in the company of Michiganders this past week that it is all slipping away from me. They spoke of W Grand Blvd. and the New Center area and I had to stretch my neurons to try and recall. Strange since this is where I spent a fair portion of a few years at the Latin Quarter. Still the best venue ever only because the floor was stepped so when you stood in the back your vista was not blocked by the philistines who will inevitably congregate in front of you with their above average height and below average courtesy. I needed to see those twins from Soho! The Latin Quarter burned down, shortly after the Ride and Lush show, no? I think so. How lovely would it be to have a job in Auburn Lull, each day you wake up and you get to create bricks for this wall of mysterious loveliness, slowly churning the mud and straw under the watchful eye of Yul Brynner. "I am off to create an enveloping wall of sound that will transport listeners back to infancy with it's soothing wash of spine tingling effortlessness". I could put that on my resume and be hired immediately for whichever position I desired. Probably. Maybe not. Michigan is infested with canadians. Small c. The governor is Canadian, I believe she is being termed out, good thing. In the anonymous township where I grew up secondly there was a Canadian woman who was deported because she had voted in elections for 18 years in a row without being a citizen. Nice Bureaucracy. She probably still votes absentee. Next song starts off with sparkling twinkles, then it begins to emote whirrs and waahhs and splashes of mercury, always silver and white and amniotic. I don't know if I have recognized a melody yet. Do I miss them? Not hardly. It is the prettiest thing I have heard in a long time. I went to see Beach House last evening, they were rather good as well. I may have to investigate one of their albums. They are on Marumari's label. What has happened to Marumari then? Has his mother locked him up in the basement? I don't know. She's doing a series on her deprivated captive. Perhaps. There is melody here, I lie, it's tectonic. Large bodies of sound moving against each other and creating rifts and uplifts and terranes and the reaction of terranes against each other represent the arc of the record. I went to the show last night and spoke to the star of the Leslies review. She is moving to San Francisco. I have asked her to be a San Francisco correspondent for this ridiculous site. She hasn't replied as of yet, but she wasn't upset with my Leslies entry which is nice of her. This is an instrumental, a storm front, so pretty. if Thomas Telford had created music instead of engineering landmarks it may have come to this. Next song has begun, just gorgeous!!! Right from the start, the tone of the string bending just absolutely sublime and then percussion like thunder next to the whispered vocals. Mesmerising!!! This may be the new album of the year. A short reign perhaps, only just over a month until the Pas/Cal album is delayed again after all. Female voice has returned, it is completely in counterpoint to the male voice, on separate channels, a call in the ether to his wayward mumblings. Amazing. i keep entering those insipid interjections, I am sorry, I just am overwhelmed by the loveliness of this record. Again, does Auburn Lull play live? Originally I had typed Oink Floyd earlier in this entry, I corrected it, but it must surely be a common punny. Right? The pig dirigible as metaphor for fat, bloated rockers everywhere. I don't know the body fat index of Auburn Lull, neither individually or as a collective, but the music is lean, strapping, remarkable. Song over, tears could be initiated by such things. Next song, a metaphor for the industrial might of Detroit petering out is portrayed at the start but hey a melody! Plucked on a guitar even. Very Slowdive this, it's post-Slowdive, an evolution, Pygmalion perfected perhaps. No attempts at Blue eye'd soul however. The industrial might being represented by a wooden block, the rouge river assembly and the fiero plant exhaling their epitaphs. The problem with Detroit is that the auto companies are run very poorly, too often they sway back and forth from allowing engineers to run the companies and then allowing businessmen to run the companies, it doesn't seem to work either way. Life in the Southeastern Michigan is akin to life on a bungee, unfathomable highs and desperate, despondent lows. This is marvelous. It's a slow perambulation (surely that is an Auburn Lull word) to a crescendo, more and more layers(read guitars) added and it's now transformed into a driving drone of tenderness. A requiem for the golden age, the Escape from Livonia. Michigan must be filled with masters of requiem these days. Industry does not even exist here in Denver. Not a single Thomas Telford admirer in our midst, probably. We are technology based, allegedly. I work for a service company. I'd say we are service based. A transitory nature surrounds everything though, there seems to b more warehouse space here than is needed. Everything appears to be moving through and it's journey made without any sort of imprint being emblazoned upon the myriad of cargo. Even the people lack a distinct identity. Natives included. This is the anthropology section. Perhaps fitness is key? Everyone in Michigan is headed for a coronary one paczki at a time. Not here. But go to events and it is always tepid appreciation. Not a lot of rabid symbiosis being applied. That's a ridiculous statement. Second time that I have said ridiculous. Quiet instrumental at the moment, maybe the lowpoint of the record, could be the lull before the storm? Who knows, it's still pretty and it has just turned even more so with the whale sound processed guitar added in. It is titled Stanfield Echo, the song lengths are much shorter than the Lull have been prone towards in the past. Manageable is the word. That was a sketch, now we reach back to the technicolour explosions! Not quite. But the wash running outside the lines is back, seeping out of the headphones into the room, covering everything with soft focus illumination. How is an Auburn Lull song written? Is it a jam process? Someone rushes in and said I dreamt last night that I was inside a Koala's pouch and it sounded like this and he proceeds to make a beguiling and lovely noise and holds that pose and slowly things are added in and then later things are taken out, strings are trimmed, the surgery is precise and finally a beautiful Auburn Lull construction is released on the other end. More Slowdive here, Blue Day era Slowdive. Perhaps I was right next to Auburn Lull man when Ride and Slowdive were playing, when Catherine Wheel and Slowdive were playing. When Rachel Goswell performed erotic maneuvers with a banana in front of the devil that fronted Catherine Wheel Perhaps. This is almost a pop song, it is propulsive and very nearly catchy. I spoke to someone once who went on a Thomas Telford tour in England and Wales. He saw the Menai Strait Bridge and Neptune's Staircase and Craigellachie, he was so impressed, I was impressed by his impression. When I went to England last I didn't do any engineering tourism. I missed out then. Thomas united the United Kingdom. Auburn Lull have no such mandate. This has started out a slight bit more intimidating, film projector clacking and stabs of mechanical distortion, a bit like the sonic maelstrom created by that pecan log in Star Trek Four. Not much of a song here so far, pretty noises and oscillations, samples of radio programs, probably newsreel footage from the blitz of Grosse Ile of 1983. Celestial references are key, when Auburn Lull began was approximately the time when Hale Bopp captivated us all. it was nice having a comet around to blame all of our ills on, it seemed a more suitable villain than global warming. Next song already, back to plainsong loveliness, it's waves and waves of delicacy. The voice, overall, seems more concerned with melody this time around, he had a chant focused imprimatur on the last album. As if he was forced into the studio by the others at the last moment and he drearily recounted his last visit to the Detroit Institute of Art and their study of contemporary art. I worked at the DIA for a short period. i was part tour guide and part janitor really. I loved it. There is an impressionism exhibit on display here in Denver at the moment. I haven't been. I am certain that impressionism is extremely popular and I am trying to pick the right day to avoid the crowds. Beautiful things draw more attention still than contemporary art. Impressionism would clearly benefit from the addition of this album to the soundtrack. If whenever you opened an oversized coffee table book in the Barnes and Noble discount section it would suddenly ring forth with the tender chimes of Arc of an Outsider it would ring up fivefold the number of sales that it currently does. Surely. My friend's brother wrote a book on the politics of impressionists, he published it on a large college press, it has mostly been unread. it is a beautifully written tome. You should have read it. I have no idea if it is still available. Last song is a "hidden" track. Traffic noise about a minute in, a extra terrestrial lantern next. Call Tom Skerritt! Ah dreaminess. A slowly plucked guitar and crickets, the beacon has been harvested and remanufactured and commercialized as would be our wont. This is beautiful. I have written beautiful a dozen times at least. it is the operative descriptor at the moment. Keyboard added to the mix, it is a slow build to something I am sure. It is almost 10 minutes long, perhaps a wordless history of the folly of the Stevens T Mason Clinton to Kalamazoo Canal. This introduction bit the first 16 miles of digging and the cello playing now the sad realization that governments were mostly useless in 1838, same as it ever was. A 20 foot wide canal only four feet deep. Lament on Auburn Lull! Of course I don't have any idea if that is what this song is about, it could just be a finger exercise of romantic escapades. It is stunning. I have used that word too many times as well. Let me consult my thesaurus for the close- admirable, alluring, angelic, appealing, beauteous, bewitching, charming, classy, comely, cute, dazzling, delicate, delightful, divine, elegant, enticing, excellent, exquisite, fair, fascinating, fine, foxy*, good-looking, gorgeous, graceful, grand, handsome, ideal, lovely, magnificent, marvelous, nice, pleasing, pretty, pulchritudinous, radiant, ravishing, refined, resplendent, shapely, sightly, splendid, statuesque, stunning, sublime, superb, symmetrical, taking, well-formed, wonderful. That about covers it.