VANDERSLICE
Image credit: Autumn de Wilde
VANDERSLICE
Music Review

Emerald City (2007)

John Vanderslice
Reviewed by Simon Vozick-Levinson | Jul 27, 2007
EW's GRADE
A-

Details Release Date: Jul 24, 2007; Lead Performance: John Vanderslice; Genre: Indie Rock

Every few years, this San Francisco-based artist and producer (Spoon, the Mountain Goats) releases a carefully crafted study in contrasts: angsty lyrics enfolded in exquisite instrumentation. And John Vanderslice's sixth full-length, Emerald City, doesn't disappoint. His sob stories, many occasioned by his real-life French lover's visa difficulties, are as moving as ever. But it's his arrangements — elegiac strumming (''Kookaburra''), amped-up outbursts (''White Dove''), even a few spectral trip-hop visions (''Tablespoon of Codeine'') — that make Emerald a gleaming gem. A-
DOWNLOAD THIS: White Dove

Originally posted Jul 27, 2007 Published in issue #946 Aug 03, 2007 Order article reprints

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