Devendra Banhart "Rejoicing in the Hands" (2004)
I'm 50/50 on this one. There are some interesting sounds on here, with compositional ideas ranging from dusty Americana, Eastern influences and indie-folk. It's a pretty stripped down record mostly centring around Banhart's high, tremulous voice and nimble guitar.
On the other hand,
I got a little tired of the constant count-ins at the start of every
second track. Not particularly difficult to edit out.. "yeah we get it,
you're not recording in a professional studio and it's all very DIY".
Also, the stripped down sound and shortness of most of the tracks
started to grate on me. As much as I often prefer songs not to overstay
their welcome, I fee like some of the songs here could have used a bit
more time to connect with the listener.
In that respect, some of my favourite parts on the album are when it changes up its approach, such as penultimate track "Insect Eyes"
taking around 5 minutes to make its point. "When the Sun Shone on
Vetiver" provides a welcome change of sound with string arrangements
mixing melodic parts with scratchy discordant strings.
"Fall" sounded familiar but I'm not sure if I've heard that song or if it' just Banhart's general sound that's familiar.
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