Fly The Ocean In A Silver Plane

元LabradfordのMark NelsonによるPan・Americanのニューアルバム。子どもの誕生や両親との別れ、人生の往還の記憶を重ね合わせ、現実と比喩の両面から「旅」がもたらす不安と驚き、孤独と希望を描き出す。ジョー・スタッフォード「You Belong to Me」とチャック・ベリー「Promised Land」に着想を得て、個人的な物語と普遍的な叙情が交差する音世界を構築。ここ数年、自宅で録音された本作では、エレクトリック・ギターやラバー・ブリッジのアコースティック・ギター、エレクトロニクスを用い、Mallory Linnehan(Chelsea Bridge)がヴァイオリンとヴォーカルで参加。ジャケットには旅立ちの気配を宿すMarkの母の写真が使われており、作品全体に静かな余韻を添えている。

As Pan•American, ambient musician Mark Nelson has gradually shifted through different phases of style and sound while maintaining the same emotional core of muted longing. Nelson was playing in the equally atmospheric band Labradford when he launched Pan•American in the late 90s, first exploring dark and dubby electronic landscapes and slowly expanding into more beat-focused pieces and then an Americana reading of his spacious ambience. Fly the Ocean in a Silver Plane is another shift for the project, moving away from the high and lonesome acoustic touches of his 2010s and early-2020s output into something thats at once more playful and more serious. The instrumentation takes different forms over the course of the ten-track album. Pieces like the angelic "Golden Gate, Silver City" and "Silver Tramway (In Snow)" are elevated by the violin and deeply obscured vocals of Chicago experimental artist Mallory Linehan (sometimes known as Chelsea Bridge), while the haunting "Death Cleaning" consists of creaky rhythmic sounds and slow-moving guitar loops. Nelsons bubbling electronics and summery field recordings give tracks like "Silver Plane, Now Boarding" a hopeful essence, even while the music here is largely inspired by themes of travel that sometimes work as a metaphor for the cycles of mortality. Even the potentially foreboding "Entrance to Afterlife" never drowns in sadness, though, with scattering synth tones and friendly, understated beats that make the song feel sweet and optimistic instead of fatalistic. Reflective and occasionally beatific, Fly the Ocean in a Silver Plane represents another chapter of evolution in the long-running Pan•American discography, one that feels a little brighter than what came before, even while meditating on the stark contrasts of life, death, and the perpetual movement that happens in between. ~ Fred Thomas