Sol Seppy played a swirly set of reverb and electronic lullabies. Reminiscent of Mazzy Star, her solo endeavors explore the mood of being in a solitary place. Her voice is captivating and no surprise that she worked on Sparklehorse’s previous albums. Her slow fuzz songs really surprised me.
After a much too long hiatus of over 5 years, Sparklehorse makes a triumphant return. The new album, “Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain”, has Tom Waits and Danger Mouse working on it, and if that doesn’t grab your attention, their live act will. I will admit that Sparklehorse’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” is easily one my top albums in my collection and so happy to have them making new tunes. The last time I saw Sparklehorse was when they made a surprise 2 song appearance before The Flaming Lips 4 years ago testing out new material. I couldn’t believe it and made that night even that more incredible. Mark Linkous is a production genius and can create these precious songs that seem to envelop and disintegrate around you. Even the more upbeat songs on the new album has dark undertones and desperate cries for happiness. The music is like a non-linear movie soundtrack of pure emotions. The lo-fi melodies make you feel so vulnerable but in the end Mark makes you realize that it’s all just a dream.
His live show gave me goose-bumps as though I was seeing a ghost that I had forgotten about. He played some old songs and some new and gave the sold out crowd an incredible performance. Sophie from Sol Seppy came out to back up a few songs but the real treat was seeing Nina Persson of The Cardigans sing “Apple Bed”. Wow! They not only gave us 2 encores (which they mentioned they NEVER do) they came out for a 3rd encore and played a new one. It truly is a wonderful life.
Pictures from the show.
Links:
http://www.solseppy.com/
http://www.myspace.com/sparklehorse