Veteran Brooklyn psych-rockers Tall Firs, not known as one of NYC's quietest bands, may have just made the most achingly beautiful folk record of the Spring with their latest release Out of it and Into It. After parting ways with longtime drummer Ryan Sawyer and returning to their original incarnation as a duo, the group has radically pushed their sound towards more pastoral realms.
While not ditching their electric guitars wholesale, this time they're used in a far more textural, delicate fashion; where there was once overdriven grit there is now clean canyon echo. Opener “Suffer So Long” is a languid, melancholy ode to the tougher parts of life we all must naturally go through. Single "Crooked Smiles" preserves a bit of the band's bite though, with driving percussion and a wonderfully overdriven guitar break, complete with hedonistic lyrics about how we should just "get high," just "get evil."
Listen, I would be lying if I said it wasn't a relatively somber affair. Not somber in a negative way, in fact there is much, much beauty in its melancholy, just don't expect to put this one on at your first BBQ this Spring; it's not that type of record. This is a record to listen to in the wee hours, laying in bed and reflecting upon the past. Not a very bad thing at all.
Tall Firs album Out of It and Into It is out now via All Tomorrow's Parties.
