There are moments of haze and dislocation that punctuate the days of this 20JFG scribe.  Days stretched to interminable limits at the ‘mill’ of our personal corporate overlords.

It is of course to be expected that the escape afforded by the sweet sounds of summer would particularly appeal in the schizophrenic depths of a British June.  And so, the temptation to submerge oneself in the fantasy of the pastoral that folk affords is as seductive as the transcendent bludgeoning dance of EBM, the delicate galactic vistas of Terry Riley.  But they always remain fragile evocations of a never lived world, no matter how much you long for the dewy grass under that ancient oak.

Loved Ones – Hi Pressure

What Hi Pressure succeeds in doing though is far more significant than the evocation of a folk pastiche.  It does the one thing that unites all the (wildly varying) music posted there, it allows for a moment of escape.  This 20JFG scribe wouldn’t have a clue what constitutes good music but music that creates its own world within the confines of 3, 4, 5, 12 minute bubbles will always justify its inclusion here.  The bowed guitars and bass hum provide the soundtrack to our elevators’ descent into the private reveries evoked in Loved Ones’ muffled vocals and world weary guitars.  A moment spent on the lowest level of this particular subconscious, hiding from the world amongst the gentle vibrations.

Hi Pressure is taken from the album The Merry Monarch which is in the process of being finished by Seal Cub Clubbing Club‘s Nik Glover and The Laze‘s Rich Hurst who together make up Loved Ones.

With a finger picked guitar flourish that would usually herald a descent into the gorgeous world of James Blackshaw, Feast of the Green Corn begins — slowly, sparsely.  The explosion into life, no less pleasurable for the inevitability of its arrival.  The energetic movement of sun-kissed fields, waving in an ancient breeze is just as ephemeral as our beloved crystalline structures that briefly loom over synth based posts.  The hint of joyous ghostly gatherings dragged from the album’s title and into being — their droning, encircling the finger picked strains of summer as the music completes the cycle of a day and beds down in the stillness of the night.

Sacred Harp – Feast Of The Green Corn

Sacred Harp is Daniel Bachman and this is from the Hands in the Dark re-release (and re-edit) of Apparitions at the Kentmore Plantation.  The self-released US version quickly sold out with the help of these guys and this European version is limited to a scant 50 copies.  It comes out on 28th June.

Anyone in London are totally advised to Top Nice’s Peckham shindig. A true classic night (20JFGs favourite in the capital for sure) going strong

Epilogue -
This post is tagged with Hands in the Dark