Leo Abrahams - The Grape and The Grain (Just)
3/5
By: Emily Kaiser
I listened to Leo Abrahams' new album, The Grape and The Grain, on one of those infamously lousy days. Caustically raining and defensively windy, as I walked to the tube I couldn't help but feel the colourfully relentless groaning of the track 'Come in the Morning' was lying to me. It's a track spirited in its slackness, sincere in its dreams, and almost too ironically clashed with what was the otherwise meaninglessly difficult start to my morning.
Similar to many other tracks off this second offering by Abrahams, a formative studio guitarist in his own right and now burgeoning soloist, the dreams of the guitar-dominated melodies live despite an apparent rocky faith. Willy Wonka would probably benefit from this sonic description of how he feels about the world outside of pure imagination, with a feeling of pointlessness to the efforts but knowing no other approach than to be pretty.
The whole album feels as if it's missed the point. If the dreams of the motif are really the message the album is trying to create, it can't possibly be attempted seriously. Remember where we exist? No one sips tea out of flower blooms, at least not yet. Confused by the either unfortunate or mocking hope, musically the album is no less supremely organic. Abrahams invents an all-instrumental dynamic production of twisting melodies and moods that ebb around a revealing normality. An array of string sounds paint the album in splatters. Plucking, strumming, and whining bows are all different voices in themselves that give new and multifaceted views of each song.
'Blind' is stylish and smart, but nonetheless dressed in black. On the other side of the vast limits of the album, 'Northern Jane' is a track of modest surrender. Accented strings and the rising despondency of acoustic arpeggios leave behind a valiant effort, and that's ok. If songs could make dialogue, and I like to think they can, this track would shrug its shoulders, say "I'm sorry man, I tried", and stare at the clouds in a complacent, but no less handsome, defeat. 'Daughter of Persuasion' is just that handsome close to the album. Much like a child refusing contamination by retreating into his or her own head, after an honest attempt in its course, the album here returns to living comfortably and vibrantly in its own skin.
Artists in this article: Leo Abrahams
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