The power of music never ceases to amaze me; I heard a clip of this album one night and felt like I absolutely had to track it down. The only problem? I\u2019ve only had my driver\u2019s license for a few months and can\u2019t park within limit lines yet. Either way, I found myself at Best Buy a few hours later, panicking the entire way there that I\u2019d crash \u2013 would the excuse that I had to buy the new Sparklehorse album work on a cop? <\/p>\n
If you\u2019re anyone but me, the answer would be a resounding no, since car repairs (not to mention gas) tends to cancel out the cost of a $10 CD. But it\u2019s hard to deny the music reviewer part of my brain, and since you\u2019re probably wondering, I was right: Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain<\/i> is absolutely fantastic. <\/p>\n
This is a triumphant release for Sparklehorse (led and anchored by vocalist, lyricist and multi-instrumentalist Mark Linkous), one that was five years in the making due to Linkous\u2019 debilitating drug addiction and his struggle with depression. For the most part, this album was recorded in bits and pieces; one song is a reshaped B-side, another was leftover from 2001\u2019s It\u2019s A Wonderful Life<\/i>, a few came out of work with Danger Mouse and the rest are new tracks laid down in Linkous\u2019 own studio. <\/p>\n
Okay, so it sounds like a mishmash that definitely shouldn\u2019t work, but each element comes together to create a surprisingly cohesive release. Just listen to the one-two punch of \u201cDon\u2019t Take My Sunshine Away\u201d and then \u201cGetting It Wrong:\u201d the former is an upbeat (in instrumentation, anyway, since the lyrics are a plea to not be abandoned by his lover), folk-rocker with bright, clear harmonies \u2013 which is then quickly countered by the subdued, crackling beat and dark, distorted vocals of \u201cGetting It Wrong.\u201d <\/p>\n
Dreamt for Light Years<\/i> shines most notably on its foray into the sunshine-pop of \u201cShade and Honey\u201d and \u201cSome Sweet Day.\u201d Both tracks are quietly beautiful, a shot of optimism with intimate vocals, catchy choruses and Linkous\u2019 usual evocative imagery in lines like \u201cStars are dying in my chest until I see you again\u201d or \u201cShe was my black earth and the fire in my spine \/ her magnetic waves gave birth \/ I was the one who loved you most but you can\u2019t put your arms around a ghost.\u201d Another standout in the same vein is \u201cReturn To Me,\u201d which balances its breathy, despairing delivery with subtle acoustic guitar and a delicately hopeful sentiment. <\/p>\n
And for its share of mope, the album has a few rockers thrown in, like \u201cGhost In The Sky\u201d (the aforementioned rescued B-side) and \u201cIt\u2019s Not So Hard\u201d featuring vocals drowned in crunchy, abrasive guitars and driving beats. <\/p>\n
Dreamt for Light Years in the Belly of a Mountain<\/i> is one of those rare albums that lures you in with a track or two and ends up fixing you there beneath the power of its entirety. For all its contradictions, Linkous has created a unified work, one that was definitely worth the five-year wait. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":28545,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[7839],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-40011","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-sparklehorse","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=40011"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=40011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}