Giant Sand
Chore Of Enchantment

Uh-oh! It has been pointed out to us that this review also appears (in whole or in part) on rootshighway.it

Hidden by the dust (which evidently felt particularly "at home" on such an album), I take in hand again this old album of the "Gigante di Sabbia," one of the most intriguing works of Giant Sand, an Arizona band championing what, in the late '80s, was defined as desert-rock.

"Chore of enchantment" is a rugged and lopsided frontier rock, where the folk and country roots are reshuffled by the lanky creativity of Gelb and his loyal adventure companions: the Convertino-Burns duo (bass-drums), the thinking minds of the other fantastic "border" group called Calexico. Recorded between Tucson, Memphis, and New York, with the involvement of no less than three different producers, the album does not seem to suffer from any disunity in sound, quite the opposite. There is, compared to the past, a more intimate and reflective openness, aligned if you will with the same minimalist, dark, humble moods of Calexico or bands like Palace and Hayden. It is the same Howe Gelb, after all, who stands as the spokesman and progenitor of these sounds, showcasing to everyone his innate ability to write skeletal ballads, in the wake of the darker and more intimate Neil Young. We are indeed faced with an almost alchemical spell: one part Giant Sand, one-third Howe Gelb, and two-thirds Calexico, in a word: enchanting and timeless music. Everything sounds "renewed" in the hands of Gelb, this man with overflowing talent, capable of astounding with writing and sounds, suddenly turning, caressing and letting instruments glide in harmonic contrast, in that dualism that portrays him as a "sensitive soul" within a profoundly punk heart. And never more than now, he appears as a balance, strong and fragile at the same time, like the painful birth of this album, conceived and born with difficulty due to a series of misfortunes of various kinds, from the death of his companion Ptacek which greatly disturbed Gelb and his group, to the refusal of the album's release by V2 because it was deemed "not commercial enough."

An intriguing work but indeed not easy to digest: lovers of more roots and classic sounds will wrinkle their noses at all these experiments and deviations. It begins with the string opening ("Overture"), moves on to the dark sound of "Dusted," not unlike Calexico's intuitions, and the beautiful folk ballad "Punishing Sun." It continues with the velvety step of "X-tra wide," featuring mellotron inserts and soft vocal parts, an excellent example of dreamy and disoriented folk-pop. "1972" offers us 60 seconds of delirious punk noise, adding madness to the work, a heartfelt homage to Beck's most crooked sound, the most controversial episode of the album, full of loops and drum machines. A small venial sin, because the rest is all superlative: the desolate melancholy of "Raw" and "Dirty from the rain," splendid ballads such as "Shiver" and "No reply," the dissonances and rock fury of "Satellite," the "ragged" country of "Way to end the day." The album closes with a heartfelt tribute to the late friend Rainer Ptacek, a great slide guitarist and frequent collaborator of Giant Sand, with the brief "Strine."

"Chore Of Enchantment" is the result of all this, a stationary journey between Tucson (with the production of John Parish), Memphis (with Jim Dickinson), and New York (with Kevin Salem and his musicians), where the different songs of the album were produced. An album of "thickness," which allows us to savor in every part all the greatness of a group almost forgotten.

One of those albums I never tire of listening to...