High Places
(Thrill Jockey)
High Places dials down the eccentricity in their second full-length, finding a very sweet spot where experimental freak folk meets top 40 diva pop. High Places Vs. Mankind is delivered in much sharper focus than the duo's earlier output, tethered to stronger, more lucid beats. Yet it still has a dreamy surreality, a lullaby softness in Mary Pearson's voice that sounds at once as if it is right next to your ear and, also, distantly inscrutable. "The Longest Shadows," opening the disc, is mostly ramshackle rhythm, fitted out with little blurts of keyboard and an eerie synthetic melody. Pearson's self-harmonies are intoxicating, warm syrup dripping over partner Rob Barber's glossy, chilly electro arrangements. "On Giving Up" has even more of a new wave, disco feel, its plasticine keyboards evoking the Cure, its insistent cadences strobe-lit and glamorous.
"She's a Wild Horse," is the dreamiest and most beautiful of these songs, taking place for once lyrically on the tropical island that High Places seems to inhabit aesthetically all the time. A mélange of wordless voices, scratchy percussion and altered guitar sets the stage for Pearson's most glancingly pretty singing. She hardly seems to touch the notes at all, just breathes on them, and they open up like flowers. Later, on "Canada," you can even hear the Rob Barber's guitar sounding, uncharacteristically for this band, very much like a guitar. Yet though rock might be suggested, here and there, by instruments and beats, Vs. Mankind has more of a downtempo hip hop vibe.
This mild, beat-centric aura reaches its peak in "On a Hill in a Bed on a Road in a House," a playground chant left to soften in warm sunshine. Its syncopated rhythms simmer but never spill over. There are no big climaxes in this album, just a consistent undulating pleasure. And while High Places may have backed off the home-recorded, skip-hopping oddities of their early singles, there's a strangeness here, too. It flickers at the edge of even their most pop-dance conventional cuts, like a hologram you can't quite believe in.
Standout Tracks: "She's a Wild Horse," "The Longest Shadows" "On a Hill in a Bed on a Road in a House" JENNIFER KELLY
