The Golden Archipelago
Shearwater
Score:55
Reviewer: Jonathan Brent
Label: Matador (USA & UK), Remote Control (Australia)
Reviewed: Mar 10th '10, Released:2010
Any breakup raises questions of custody. And the dissolution of the Jonathan Meiburg–Will Sheff songwriting partnership at the heart of Shearwater is no exception to this rule. But if I were Shearwater’s Meiburg, I’d be demanding another look at the prenup, because Okkervil River frontman Sheff seems to have been left with the lion’s share of the musical charm and Meiburg was just lumped with a whole lot of earnestness.
Both Meiburg and Sheff come across as highly personal songwriters. But where Okkervil River off-handedly channel this surplus of affect into springy, witty songs, Shearwater are happy to bludgeon you with melodrama.
On the plus side, all this melodrama makes The Golden Archipelago an unqualified success in terms of atmosphere. From start to finish, Shearwater’s sixth LP maintains a frosty appearance. With repeated spins, it becomes clear that the band have given timbre a near-autistic level of consideration. The layered guitars, the insistent percussion, the piano chords both monolithic and intimate — everything sounds just as it should. The album can be as intangible as mist (‘Hidden Lakes’) or gloriously, viscerally corporeal (‘Corridors’). It may not break any ground aurally, but it does what it sets out to do with aplomb.
But in spite of its epic arrangements, Archipelago seems perversely content to recede into the background. It is considered, sure. Proficient too. But surely these are second-tier adjectives where an album aspires to be something more. Unlike some of their more well known contemporaries the album rarely grabs you by the lapels. Ultimately, it never does much more than politely tap you on the shoulder.
It’s abundantly clear that Meiburg and co. know what they’re doing, but this alone doesn’t translate into a great album. If Shearwater could just rustle up a little bit more verve for their next release, they, and Meiburg particularly, could truly escape from the shadow of bands past.
