Eight Pointed Star

モダンな質感も手に入れた現代最高品質のアシッドフォーク。
「FIRE」からの2年振り3作目。アシッドフォークからアメリカーナを飲み込みながら、70年代ウエストコーストを想わせるその音世界は相変わらず。更に今作ではぐっとモダンな印象となったジャケからも伝わる通りにワイズブラッドに通じる現代的でありながら妖艶で幻想的な空気もあり。未だ見ぬ未来を彷徨うような(2)伸びやかな唄声と神秘的なサウンドスケープが美しい(3)モダンに消化された極上のアメリカーナ(4)...確かなルーツと芳醇な感性が産んだ名作。

After stretching her wings stylistically and compositionally on the adventurous Centrifics, which took influence from artists like Meredith Monk and Joanna Newsom, singer/songwriter Marina Allen settles into warmer, earthier territory on Eight Pointed Star. Both albums were produced by Chris Cohen (Weyes Blood, Ohmme), and here Allen is joined by a full band. Named for a pattern commonly found in quilts, Eight Pointed Star looks to the past, future, family, and folklore for its subject matter. A song like "Red Cloud," for instance, is named for the birthplace of Willa Cather and imagines her mothers family back in rural Nebraska with such evocative phrasing as "I make a stew with rainwater and frozen meat, thick with pine needles, warm beer, and baby teeth"). Manifesting the dreamy, easygoing sound of reflection, that song features a laid-back jazz-pop groove, piano and synthesizer (by Andrew Dorsett), and occasional violin (by Odessa Jorgensen) and guitar synthesizer (by Hand Habits) alongside the singers drifting melody. An affectionate relationship song, the lightly twangy "Easy" is another dreamy entry, this one with some of the albums frequent literary, historical, and pop culture references (East of Eden, "the prodigal son"). The enigmatic, piano-based "Deep Fake" contains lines including "From Bitches Brew to Antigone," while the driving, early rock-oriented "Love Comes Back" keeps things relatively straightforward with its often-repeated title. Throughout Eight Pointed Stars various stylistic touchpoints, artistic allusions, and consistently lyrical melodies, Allen effectively merges the cerebral and the sentimental on an album thats ultimately about different kinds of love. ~ Marcy Donelson