Juliana Barwick - Florine (From Salisbury Journal)

Juliana Barwick - Florine

10:26am Tuesday 5th May 2009

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Artist - Juliana Barwick
Album - Florine
Label - Emusic.com

Let's face it, Enya is just plain annoying, and took a basically good Cocteau Twins idea and drove it straight to the middle of the (Irish) road.

Julianna Barwick is a Brooklyn-based performer, who instead takes that idea and drives it off the road onto a Tibetan mountain top.

This is Zen-like trance music made from the purest vocals and synth loops - as relaxing as New Age-y whale music, but with a nod to indie sensibilities.

No words are heard in the echoing soundspace, the harmonies bouncing around an arched monastery space.

Barwick's methods are simple - looped vocals essentially improvised the way that Andrew Bird arranges his violin and guitars. And it is to the interplay in the voices that this record owes its magnetic ability - it pulls you in deeply, as in some lovely dream.

It is relaxing, it is a thing of beauty, and perhaps just as importantly it doesn't really depend on your perspective coming in.

Like being taken by the stillness in the most magnificent cathedrals, sometimes listening attentively is enough.

Rating 7/10
Mike Rea

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