How does one qualify a record as beautiful? With other art forms, it's easy; a painting can be attractive or not, a theatrical production can capture human truths and faithfully represent them, a dance can be fluid in its' execution and affecting in its' performance – all of those things can be beautiful – but how does recorded music attain that state? The single most effective way for a record to accomplish it is to affect its' audience and tap into a chord that simply resonates in listeners. That's what makes music special and separate from other artforms; anything else, you can see and appreciate, but you can feel music and appreciate that sensation as much as the sound.
That question of feeling and beauty is raised by singer Mark Kozelek's performance on Admiral Fell Promises. Form the opening outpouring of “Alesund,” Kozelek's voice and nylon-stringed acoustic guitar take all of the attention listeners have because there are no other sounds present to distract from those things; usually, Kozelek has some extra help in fleshing out his compositions but, here, he plays alone – with nowhere to hide and no excuses to make.
Happily he needs no excuses or diversions here. From moment one, listeners will find themselves falling into a starry-eyed state of wonder and bliss as Kozelek weaves a bit of practical magic with nothing more than some arpeggiated chords and his own hesitant but captivating voice.
The atmosphere that those simple tools are capable of creating on Admiral Fell Promises is pretty remarkable – in songs like “Half Moon Boy,” the title track, “Australian Winter” and “Church Of The Pines,” Kozelek has his audience eating out of the palm of his hand as he gently and easily casts out tales that are as personal as they could be public; he takes his entire narrative landscape and internalizes it before offering his own heartfelt impressions of it all to listeners. That would be a fantastic impression to make in itself but, because the themes addressed are so universal, Kozelek can do no wrong. On Admiral Fell Promises, the singer puts his heart and soul into all of the album's ten songs and that excuses the fact that not every line is genius (those who catch it will laugh in spite of themselves when Kozelek utters something like his observations of “skinny girls and pudgy, ugly dudes in “Third And Seneca”), and not every image is flawless. When the images do falter, that's when the singer's guitar takes up the slack and covers the weaknesses with spidery and intoxicating fretwork though, so no song really bottoms out here.
Reading that there may, in fact, be a flaw lodged somewhere in the run-time of Admiral Fell Promises will probably shock those who have already heard the record. Their minds will spin; they've never noticed anything out of place during any of the times they've listened to the record (which is likely no small number) and even listening now, with that knowledge in hand, they still may not catch them. Such is the nature of this beautiful record; one is quickly engulfed in listening and, like a moment of true love, Admiral Fell Promises can do no wrong.
Artist:
www.sunkilmoon.com/
www.myspace.com/sunkilmoon
Download:
Sun Kil Moon – “Admiral Fell Promises” – Admiral Fell Promises
Album:
Admiral Fell Promises is out now. Buy it here on Amazon .
