Balmorhea - "Rivers Arms" & "All is Wild, All is Silent"
My brother-in-law is now two-for-two with albums for Christmas presents. Last year, it was Dosh's "Wolves & Wishes" (which I posted a thread about, too). This year, it's the indie band Balmorhea. They're an indie band, but since 'indie' isn't really a genre, it takes more to describe them. I'm rec'ing two albums here, one which has an indie approach to classical (Rivers Arms) and one which has more of an ambient folk sound (All is Wild). Both are peaceful albums, and in my personalized genre definition of ambient, I'm putting 'em here.
"Rivers Arms" & "All is Wild, All is Silent"
They employ a wonderful diversity of instruments, including several types of guitar, piano, melodica, banjo, violin, cello, double bass, electronics, kick drum, and field recordings.
On "Rivers Arms" (the one I received as a present), it's more piano based, with some appealing folkish guitar intervals. More along the lines of what the band Eluvium is doing. I was surprised to find out the band was from Austin; I'd just assumed from their sound that they were a Pacific Northwest band.
I haven't yet purchased "All is Wild, All is Silent", but I've heard enough to know that it's only a question of whether the emu DLs have a January or February tag on them. It falls in line with the Message to Bears I rec'd earlier, sort of an instrumental Nick Drake folkish kind of thing.
Here's their emusic page...
http://www.emusic.com/artist/Balmorhea-MP3-Download/11900359.html
And here's their myspace page...
http://www.myspace.com/balmorhea
"Rivers Arms" & "All is Wild, All is Silent"
They employ a wonderful diversity of instruments, including several types of guitar, piano, melodica, banjo, violin, cello, double bass, electronics, kick drum, and field recordings.
On "Rivers Arms" (the one I received as a present), it's more piano based, with some appealing folkish guitar intervals. More along the lines of what the band Eluvium is doing. I was surprised to find out the band was from Austin; I'd just assumed from their sound that they were a Pacific Northwest band.
I haven't yet purchased "All is Wild, All is Silent", but I've heard enough to know that it's only a question of whether the emu DLs have a January or February tag on them. It falls in line with the Message to Bears I rec'd earlier, sort of an instrumental Nick Drake folkish kind of thing.
Here's their emusic page...
http://www.emusic.com/artist/Balmorhea-MP3-Download/11900359.html
And here's their myspace page...
http://www.myspace.com/balmorhea
Comments
From Wikipedia: "Balmorhea were influenced by Ludovico Einaudi, The Six Parts Seven, Claude Debussy, Ludwig van Beethoven, Rachel's, Gillian Welch, Max Richter, Arvo P