Marriages
Salome
Reviewed by: Max Miller
Marriages might be described as post-post-rock. The Los Angeles trio features Emma Ruth Rundle and Greg Burns, both members of monolithic post-rock band Red Sparowes, which, at various points, has featured members of Isis, A Storm of Light and Made Out of Babies. Unlike that group’s winding, exploratory compositions, which often sail recklessly past the seven- or eight-minute mark, Marriages construct more restrained pockets of energy — still structured around the same kinds of build-ups and crescendos, but more concise.
On Salome, the group’s debut full-length, songs like “The Liar” and “Southern Eye” seem anchored by drummer Andrew Clinco’s crazed tom-pounding, allowing them to pitch and yaw between Rundle’s alternatingly ethereal and scything guitar lines. Her debut solo album, Some Heavy Ocean, was a muted, affecting affair — seeing her live last year, I found her music verging on trance-inducing. She often sings with more unbridled power here, her reverb-strengthened choruses often heralding a peak in the music even more so than a sudden wave of distortion from the guitar and bass.
If Salome suffers from anything, it’s a lack of variety. Each song relies on more or less the same formula. It’s still a strong formula, though; one still just engrossing enough to attract listeners outside the expected range of post-rock space cadets.
Rating: Bad-Ass
