Slowly, Great Elk’s songs creep from a position of distance and unfamiliarity to a timeless groove, like something your parents would play on the first cold day of fall. Starting out sparse and confused, Vocalist Paul Basile carries the band as they gently layer their sound, adding minimalist drum and bass, with an ever-weeping pedal steel guitar. Bryan Trenis’s dramatic keyboards and, “approximate vegetarianism,” help to portray the lonesome yet confident quality of Great Elk’s sound. They have self- released two EP’s, handing out limited editions to lucky show-goers this past February, and are currently on tour in Portland, Oregon, but will soon return to their home of Brooklyn.
We've always been big fans of Luke Temple, and it's good to see that, together with the Here We Go Magic crew, the man is keeping at it with increasingly beautiful records and videos. The band's new album "A Different Ship" (stream it here) will be out on May 8, and betrays at least a partial return to Luke Temple's more intimate and melodic sound from his solo repertoire - in this regard, lend a ear to "Hard to Be Close," "Alone but Moving" and "Over the Ocean". This is welcome news for fans like us who always thought that in most HWGM material Luke's noteworthy songwriting skills seemed a little sacrificed on the altar of textural experimentation. This doesn't mean that the band's signature hypnotic, impressionistic sound is lost - it's just that these two elements work together better than they did in past records, and this is what makes this album one of the NYC highlights of the year so far. Indeed, this collection also features songs more in line with the band's past releases ("Make Up your Mind", "I Believe in Action"), which follow on the steps of brainy-pop icons like Brian Eno and The Feelies, but there's definitely a balance here, also betrayed by the almost perfect alternation of melodic songs and less traditional ones.The just released video of "How Do I Know," telling the story of a rejected dancing robot that ends up revitalizing an older man's appreciation for life, seems to reflect on this brain/heart, mechanic/organic dichotomies and somehow bring them to unity. - PDG
