5 out of 5

Label: Auris Apothecary

Produced by: Joel Henline

Beware of really talented, creative people! You’ll try, and try, to put them in a box to make your marginally less-talented and creative self feel better – ‘oh, that Joel Henline can only play spazzy thrash music,’ as a completely random example – only to have them burst out of the box under a new guise and show you some other three-dimensional, talented, creative side of themselves! Worst – your box is ruined, and you have to go back to the box store, my reviews of box options forthcoming.

But back to these darned creative types, and okay, this Joel Henline I’ve mentioned, who we’ve previously seen iterate otherwise in Ex-Fauna and Disperser, and already I should’ve figured this person as multi-faceted, since there’s a line between those groups, but now to draw a greater distinction, we have Iota Leonis’ clean, contemplative guitar compositions – mature, paced note and chord explorations of a moody post-rock variety, multi-tracked unindulgently to wring maximum impact from the minimal. While we have decades of experimental players doing layers and layers of guitars to add often unheard dimension, Henline’s approach gives immense weight to the initially solo playing, with the shimmer of a sound suddenly, hauntingly indicating to us that there’s more depth to this than perceived. When that is further fleshed out with the addition of Gnaw Bone’s BW adding strings and effects – and again, at very particular, paced moments – it’s incredibly striking. These four tracks, ranging from 3- to 6-minutes, do more emotional heavy lifting than some post-rockers 2 CD epics.

Henline’s harsher impulses bubble up from underneath but never overwhelm or change the tone: static; some oomph from distortion. And finally, a full-on post-rock release in closer (and appropriately titled) Epoch, which, again, doesn’t have to shoot for the moon to hit its target: it’s mainly just guitars and drums, playing some solid riifs, but its impact is earned by the sincerity and patience of what’s led up to it.

Dante Augustus Scarlatti’s design work on the cassette packaging, as usual, doesn’t let us down, giving the thing a mysterious and spacey wash of imagery and colors.