Pale Horse Rider

Prolific and versatile, Los Angeles musician Cory Hansons music has many faces. As the frontperson of Wand, Hanson and his bandmates churned out ragged and glorious psychedelic art rock, but his duo with like-minded polymath Ty Segall toned the experimentation down a touch for more acoustically drawn surreal rock. When Hanson issued his first solo album with 2016s The Unborn Capitalist from Limbo, it was a set of murmuring orchestral acid folk tunes akin to Jessica Pratts gentle songcraft, or Syd Barrett at his softest and most contemplative. With second solo album Pale Horse Rider, Hanson goes in yet another direction, shaking off the reverb and fuzz of previous outings for an album of restrained and melancholic Americana. This change, of course, is announced with album-opener Paper Fog, setting the pace with a subdued country-rock arrangement thats vast enough to hold both gliding pedal steel guitar runs, Hansons drifting vocal harmonies, and understated moments of synth disruptions. The psychedelic elements are toned down throughout Pale Horse Rider, but show up in the form of unexpected lulls filled with field recordings or unexpected left turns, like the jazzy outro of Bird of Paradise, or the sudden break into Neil Young-grade guitar distortion on Another Story from the Center of the Earth. Several of the albums best songs find Hansons lonely vocals front and center. Angeles surrounds the singer with backing from bass and a steady kick drum, highlighting his plaintive but still somewhat abstract lyrics linking the Los Angeles wildfires to searching for fulfillment in life and relationships. Hanson sings about someone driving an ambulance in his dreams as wails of noisy feedback squelch low in the mix. The swaying title track is a lush blend of organic instruments pushing ahead triumphantly and a chorus of affected, otherworldly backing vocalists joining Hanson like a collection of angelic aliens. Brief ambient interludes Necklace and Surface to Air link the more traditionally structured tunes, providing the equivalent of starry night skies to Hansons desert-colored songs. Pale Horse Rider is lonely, lamenting, and distant but beautifully warm, marrying Hansons love of psychedelic experimentation with a more cosmic take on country. Its more immediate than his sometimes-deranged earlier work, but never so straitlaced as to feel safe or predictable. ~ Fred Thomas

LAのサイケデリックロックバンドのフロントマン=Cory Hansonのソロアルバム『Pale Horse Rider』で彼の音楽の多面性に舌を巻いた。 カントリーをベースに穏やかなアコースティック調な《Another Story From the Center of the Earth》や、民謡のような柔らかさ懐かしさを思わせる《Pale Horse Rider》など、様々な側面を持つ楽曲との多幸感を高めていく。また素朴で柔らかいアレンジとアンビエントなインターバルも相まって、アルバムを通して悠然とした世界へ私たちを誘う。透き通った音色が心に染み渡る味わい深さに、彼の唯一無二の才能を感じる。多くの音楽ファンに推薦したいアルバムだ。
intoxicate (C)石田真生