Your man formerly of Ultimate Painting and your boy from BEAK>> combine forces to create exactly what you'd hope would emerge from the union of those two bands. Bucolic, pastoral, lysergic motorik folk. A right old mix, that. As band names go, they're perfectly labelled. And yet, there's something a little bigger than the constituent parts at play here.
To my ears, this is easily the best record Jack Cooper has put his name to, and moves his songwriting forward in a way that feels less tied to its influences (or that those influences have become a little wider). There's a natural ease to these songs, unhurried but confident, effortlessly purposeful, like plants moving towards the light. There are proggy, jam-band like instincts at work for sure, but in a way that serves the song, and crucially, the listener. In that sense, more kraut than prog, the quieter moments recalling Camera Obscura (the one on Origination West, that is) or Popol Vuh. A lot of that can be attributed to the soft-focus production, which is so unobtrusive you're immediately aware of how this will take shape when performed. Which is also a neat segueway into mentioning they're playing in the shop on Saturday afternoon. Lovely stuff.
