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Rating:
A mythical figure, without place or time, not a person, but a solemn voice, singing stories of the past, from other times, that smell of legend, melodies, tunes that somewhere, who knows where you've already heard, evoke memories now remote, of dreams faded, forgotten…
A Singer-songwriter… Michael Krassner is the soul, the heart and mind behind two important projects of the late century/early millennium; that semi-unknown Boxhead Ensemble that brought together artists of the caliber of Dirty Three, Jeff Tweedy (the mind behind Wilco), Gastr Del Sol for a strange music for the soundtrack of unseen documentaries or perhaps old silent films from the early 1900s; and these Lofty Pillars with which the grace, the refinement, the decadent melancholy of this great, great singer-songwriter has managed to fully blossom, in its heart-wrenching beauty…
His compositions are classics at birth without the verdict of time, because they carry a centuries-old tradition, sometimes from American folk song, sometimes from austere chamber music, always with an impressive class and emotional charge…
Musically it's as if the Great Tradition of Dylan's 'Desire' (the seven minutes of “Three Men”), of Blonde On Blonde, of the first Cohen, of the more “spiritual” Cave (the one of “Good Son”) were revisited in light of new experiences from the Nineties, from Red House Painters to American Music Club and Dirty Three…
And an absolutely essential aspect for the magic, the alchemy of this album are the arrangements that paint and embroider, transporting Krassner's poems to an indefinite past, a past that could perfectly fit in the same Belle Epoque Café where languid and shy resonates the music of the epic, unforgettable (for me) Penguin Café Orchestra… Indeed not an electric guitar but a dusty old piano, violas and cellos and English horns and its deep, stunning, touching, low, disillusioned, sad whisper…
Elusive masterpiece…
Tracklist and Videos
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