4 out of 5

Label: VHF Records

Produced by: Stephen Griesgraber (recorded by)

An affecting assault of acoustic strums from Alexander Turnquist, offering a kind of maximalist / minimalist approach that does mean some nuance gets lost in the noisy sauce, but it’s also such an atypical vibe for this genre – and sans the kind of forced “oddity” of Alexander’s VHF debut – that it’s truly entrancing.

‘As The Twilight Crane Creams In Color’ offers us three long form tunes, perhaps each comprised of two sections, given their naming structures. Only opener ‘The REM Cycle – Dream Phase’ really takes advantage of that to full effect, though, providing two distinct parts of a song that feel thematically / emotionally linked. Closer ‘Dancing In Borealis – Ribbons Of Vivacity’ makes use of the split in its final minute, really driving home the ending – allowing a listener to breath and appreciate what we’ve been through – but also driving home how that kind of space would have been useful if peppered moreso through ‘Borealis’ and the preceding ‘Statues In The Dark – Shadows Collide.’

That aside, the general approach to ‘Twilight’ is to strum, open-handed, loud, constant, consistently. It’s ragga-adjacent in that sense, but the pace is quicker, and Turnquist sticks to more of a traditional rock or pop sound in terms of chord progressions as opposed to leaning in to a folk or Americana twinge, which is usually the carryover from Fahey and other common inspirators of this scene. It’s so busy, and brightly recorded by Stephen Griesgraber, that you sincerely can’t help but be kind of overwhelmed – in a positive way – with the music, its pleasantness washing over you in a drone / noise fashion, but cleanly played in a way that betrays those styles. When vibraphone or keys gets added in (also from Turnquist), it pushes the feeling into overdrive, which is really the ante up from ‘Statues’ to ‘Dancing,’ with the latter adding a joyous layer with its extra instrumentation.

Kicking off with REM is really the kicker, though, as its appropriately dream-like, looping chord progressions are the most accessible, and staircase-like – leading you deeper up or down or into the musical journey, such that when the song breaks for its ‘Dream Phase’ half – a pulsing of minimalist harmonics and building, subtle violin from Christopher Tignor – the juxtaposition to comparative quiet is stunning.