Strand of Oaks - Dark Shores [Two Limited Edition Color Vinyl Options]

 

On Dark Shores, Showalter trades in his obscure references, convoluted plotlines, and grandiosity for bite-sized versions of his smoky-flavored brooding folk: condensed and accessible. He teamed up with John Vanderslice as producer, gave him some creative license, and ended up with a record every bit as cryptic and ambitious as its predecessor, even if the songs’ lengths and catchy melodies might sound otherwise. There are the record’s insane themes. Most, if not all, of these songs come from the perspective of a lonely, heartbroken man, stranded on the surface of the moon, longing for a former lover, cogitating the mistakes he had made with her, dwelling on the past, and firing flares up into the atmosphere in hopes of bringing her back to him. Then there’s the record’s peculiar, striking production, with Vanderslice’s signature messy hi-fi touch rippling through these songs’ simple anatomies. True to its name, the record’s surface glistens atop densely dark shores — a bottomless abyss pulling down on everything above it.

01 Diamond Drill 2:19
02 Satellite Moon 2:16
03 Maureens 3:39
04 Little Wishes 4:16
05 Trap Door 3:31
06 Dark Shores 3:10
07 Last Grain 2:54
08 Spacestations 3:03
09 Hard To Be Young 3:20
10 Sleeping Pills 2:33