This is one of those albums that makes more sense in the darkness.
“Really Good Terrible Things” is the work of Ray Alder and Jim Matheos, but it’s going down a different path. You’ve had full (Fates) warning (sorry!)
“Open Book” kicks (and that’s the wrong word) this off and its gentle brooding is an example of that.
Indeed, the beauty of this is in the texture. The understated colors of “Flowers In Decay,” in which Ray Alder sings “it’s difficult to blame others for my mistakes,” and that type of regret, that type of reflection, is all the way through. “Unmoved,” with its tender piano and trippy drums, woos their way in.
“The Mission” has a chug through the shadows. It’s not too hard to imagine this as post-rock, and certainly it, and the next one “Where I’m From,” pull off the neat trick of sounding epic and being over and done in under four minutes.
When it is longer, in the prog-tinged “We Move Around The Sun,” it is superbly cinematic, and the gentle vibe is perfect on “Touch The Sky” with its slide guitar break but only sparse rhythms.
Indeed, “sparse” is a good word for the whole thing. “Poetry” too. On perhaps the best one here, “No Maps,” which adds some glitchy electronica, they offer a couple of lines right at the end that might sum up the project: “There are no maps where I am going, follow my own path ahead without care. There are no maps where I’m going – and maybe I’m already there.”
Whatever journey this was on, I think we can assume it’s found peace. And if there are no terrible things here, North Sea Echoes have made sure there’s plenty of really good ones.
Rating: 8/10
