The beauty of specialist labels with a strong aesthetic identity is that they can oblige their artists and tantalise their customers in ways that make life a lot richer, and reviewing a little bit trickier.
This particular Leaf Label offering started in May and June as two limited edition 12" vinyl EPs. It will soon become a full album that combines them on 2 CDs and makes them available for download release.
The whole project, Rivers, constitutes the third album by Sweden’s WILDBIRDS & PEACEDRUMS. W&H did enjoy "The Snake" and "Heartcore", very much. Mariam Wallentin and Andreas Werliin are fiercely expressive in live performance and succeed wonderfully in conveying the same emotional immediacy and bodily presence in their recordings. Mariam sings, Andreas play percussion.
"Retina", was the first of the EPs and the first part of the album. It was recorded in Iceland's Guðríðarkirkja with the Schola Cantorum Reykjavík Chamber Choir, arranged by Reykjavík's Hildur Guðnadóttir (of Múm). The uncompromising vocal/drums approach is gently enriched by the choir. It feels to me like this is Mariam's half. Its five songs and 22 minutes seem to bring more of the female senses and feelings to the themes of landscape, water, light and changing appearances. There is a yearning and a melancholy in the songs that leave a generous space for the second part, "Iris".
Here again are five songs, lasting just over 20 minutes. Where the choir cradled and nurtured the Nordic mournfulness of "Retina", we have Werliin's delightful addition of steel pans. They shift the feelings in a warmer direction, while staying with those themes of water, light and place. Things seem to open out and hope spreads like a warm sunrise. "Something better will come, after the sunset and the nightfall" sings Mariam on "The Course". Recorded in Reykjavík’s Greenhouse studios, there is a closer intimacy, a shift of perspective that nonetheless lingers on the transience of appearances, reflections and poetic possibilities.
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"Rivers" is a profound and moving album. By leaving the lyrical imagery as archetypal (man as the well, for example), the musical intensity is allowed the power to call up strong, personal responses in the listener. Its careful structuring will allow the resonances to deepen over repeated plays and leave all but the bleakest sprit in a stronger, more optimistic frame of mind. Virtuoso musicianship and a wealth of sonic treats can be taken for granted.
http://wildbirdsandpeacedrums.com
http://theleaflabel.com/wildbirdsandpeacedrums
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