Telegraph Canyon

The Tide and the Current

(Velvet Blue)

Record Review by Amber Henson

Yay!  It’s so good to get to review an album with such great driving beats.  My favorite!

Of course, driving beats are all brawn, but luckily Telegraph Canyon has lots of brain, too.  Intriguing lyrics like “You’re nobody ‘til you’re breathing, nobody ‘til you’re dead,”Irish folk sounds, and Chuck Brown’s vocals, which are a combination of Switchfoot’s Jon Foreman and Fleet Foxes’ Robin Pecknold.  They’re a little shoegazer, a little country, all live and full of energy.

The recordings on the album feel very live, and Brown’s vocals are very stripped down. Oftentimes I got the feeling, sitting in my kitchen with all the lights on, that I was at The Hotel Café, with a spotlight on the band, perhaps just on Tamara Cauble, the violist and sometimes vocalist.  There’s an earnestness to their music. 

It usually takes me a few months to actually determine what the theme of an album, or really even what most songs are about.  But I have picked up that there is some questioning of how things are done in this album, and some thoughts about getting hurt.  “Would you ever, would you ever think twice?” Brown sings in track eight, titled “Captain.”  The Tide and the Current is one of those albums that has so much to offer that the listener can be in practically any mood and then songs will mold themselves to that listener.

The last track, “Reels and Wires,” clocks in at over six minutes, and takes a minimalist approach along with having an amazing harmonic ending that reminds me of someone periodically turning a light switch on and off, where they’ll stop and you’ll think the song is over, but think again!  They’re back for another few seconds, with all the beautiful sounds of breathing and covering one another.  A worthy finish to a great album.