Bowerbirds 'Upper Air'

When I wrote about Bowerbirds' debut LP last year, I said that their music was entirely pleasant and listenable without doing anything much to make the listener really set up and take notice. They return here with a reduced line up, now just husband and wife Phil Moore and Beth Tacular, and to a certain extent more of the same. It all seems a little more focused and direct though.

Take opener 'House of Diamonds', a song advocating giving up the city life and moving to the country and embracing the natural world where "you are already free"..could be awful but the beguiling melody and Moore's strong, twisting vocal carries it through. There are moments too, when the rustic sounding acoustic guitars and accordions pause, allowing Moore and Tacular to share harmonies, their vocals mixing well together and creating an atmosphere something like early-Low.

Best of all though is 'Northen Lights', an exceptionally pretty love song presumably written by Moore for Tacular. It is both well written ("I don't expect a southern gril to know the northern lights") and very lovely ("All I want is your eyes, in the morning, as we wake for a short while").

The record drifts a little midway through before finishing with the sparse and thoughtful 'This Day'. Bowerbirds have a great album in them. That much is clear from the best stuff here and the spellbinding moments when Moore and Tacular sing together unaccompanied. I'd like to hear more of that, for now this is a fine and very listenable record.

7.8

['Upper Air' is out now on Dead Oceans]