PHOSPHORESCENT
''PRIDE''
OCTOBER 22 2007
41:15
1/A Picture of Our Torn Up Praise/3:17
2/Be Dark Night/4:00
3/Wolves/6:14
4/At Death, A Proclamation/1:52
5/The Waves at Night/4:17
6/My Dove, My Lamb/9:25
7/Cocaine Lights/6:01
8/Pride/6:09
REVIEW
by Ned Raggett
On his latest album under the Phosphorescent guise, Mathew Houck continues his work with reflective folk music given a somewhat ethereal bent. If not as gone as some of the performers in the field in recent years who seem to balance between stability and the lack thereof, Houck beats the heck out of so many who seem to only want to become the new Dan Fogelberg (sometimes with Tim Weisberg and sometimes without). Pride's eight songs are an almost fully solo effort, aside from some backing harmonies on a couple of tracks; as a one-man band, Houck shows he can re-create the as-if-it-was-a-live-jam feeling well; if by necessity songs like "A Picture of Our Torn Up Praise" can sometimes sound almost too perfect, their edges are sometimes just frayed enough. Tambourines stretch out towards the end of one song, while intercutting wordless harmonies, and soft yelps flesh out the arrangements further (a combination used to excellent effect to close out the title track and album as a whole). His fondness for his own harmony overdubs partially explains why he's received mentions from the Animal Collective fan base in its various incarnations, but Houck has his own spin on a deeper and more reflective approach that sometimes suggests early Spiritualized circa "Feel So Sad." His arrangements at their lushest are beautifully ragged, a mélange of psych/Americana that don't suggest one era or group of performers as much as a careful mishmash of them all, as is readily heard on the downbeat epic of "Wolves," the album's clear standout, and the rich blend of acoustic and electric elements on "My Dove, My Lamb," one of the more interesting uses of Christian imagery in a seemingly non-Christian vein currently out there.
BIOGRAPHY
by David Jeffries
Athens, Georgia resident Matthew Houck is the sole member of Phosphorescent. Houck's career began in 2000 when he released the Hipolit album under the name Fillup Shack. A tour of England and Spain followed, and while the European press drew comparisons to Bob Dylan and Will Oldham, the London Evening Standard declared him "the most significant American in his field since Kurt Cobain." Houck's first release as Phosphorescent, entitled A Hundred Times or More, appeared in 2003 on the Warm label. The 2004 EP The Weight of Flight was his last release for the label, as the 2005 full-length Aw Come Aw Wry landed on Misra. Two years later the release of Pride began a relationship with the Dead Oceans imprint. To Willie, Phosphorescent's tribute to Willie Nelson, arrived in early 2009, followed by the all-new Here's to Taking it Easy in 2010. In 2013, after extensive international touring, Houck released his sixth album, Muchacho, returning somewhat to the more experimental textures of Pride.
DoWnLoAd
''PRIDE''
OCTOBER 22 2007
41:15
1/A Picture of Our Torn Up Praise/3:17
2/Be Dark Night/4:00
3/Wolves/6:14
4/At Death, A Proclamation/1:52
5/The Waves at Night/4:17
6/My Dove, My Lamb/9:25
7/Cocaine Lights/6:01
8/Pride/6:09
REVIEW
by Ned Raggett
On his latest album under the Phosphorescent guise, Mathew Houck continues his work with reflective folk music given a somewhat ethereal bent. If not as gone as some of the performers in the field in recent years who seem to balance between stability and the lack thereof, Houck beats the heck out of so many who seem to only want to become the new Dan Fogelberg (sometimes with Tim Weisberg and sometimes without). Pride's eight songs are an almost fully solo effort, aside from some backing harmonies on a couple of tracks; as a one-man band, Houck shows he can re-create the as-if-it-was-a-live-jam feeling well; if by necessity songs like "A Picture of Our Torn Up Praise" can sometimes sound almost too perfect, their edges are sometimes just frayed enough. Tambourines stretch out towards the end of one song, while intercutting wordless harmonies, and soft yelps flesh out the arrangements further (a combination used to excellent effect to close out the title track and album as a whole). His fondness for his own harmony overdubs partially explains why he's received mentions from the Animal Collective fan base in its various incarnations, but Houck has his own spin on a deeper and more reflective approach that sometimes suggests early Spiritualized circa "Feel So Sad." His arrangements at their lushest are beautifully ragged, a mélange of psych/Americana that don't suggest one era or group of performers as much as a careful mishmash of them all, as is readily heard on the downbeat epic of "Wolves," the album's clear standout, and the rich blend of acoustic and electric elements on "My Dove, My Lamb," one of the more interesting uses of Christian imagery in a seemingly non-Christian vein currently out there.
BIOGRAPHY
by David Jeffries
Athens, Georgia resident Matthew Houck is the sole member of Phosphorescent. Houck's career began in 2000 when he released the Hipolit album under the name Fillup Shack. A tour of England and Spain followed, and while the European press drew comparisons to Bob Dylan and Will Oldham, the London Evening Standard declared him "the most significant American in his field since Kurt Cobain." Houck's first release as Phosphorescent, entitled A Hundred Times or More, appeared in 2003 on the Warm label. The 2004 EP The Weight of Flight was his last release for the label, as the 2005 full-length Aw Come Aw Wry landed on Misra. Two years later the release of Pride began a relationship with the Dead Oceans imprint. To Willie, Phosphorescent's tribute to Willie Nelson, arrived in early 2009, followed by the all-new Here's to Taking it Easy in 2010. In 2013, after extensive international touring, Houck released his sixth album, Muchacho, returning somewhat to the more experimental textures of Pride.
DoWnLoAd
