(2015) José González - Vestiges & Claws [FLAC,Tracks] {100.XY}

Review:
Earth is a speck in the universe. This is a common idea expressed by everyone from astronomer Carl Sagan to forwarded email threads from distant relatives with subject lines like “Feeling Small Yet?”. In Sagan’s book Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space, he laments the injustices and grievances humankind hold against one another on this “mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” It’s a beautiful and humbling thought. Whereas Sagan celebrated life by looking outward at the vastness of the cosmos, Swedish singer-songwriter José González looks closer to home to examine our logic-defying existence on his third solo album, Vestiges & Claws.
González is far from the first artist to tackle this concept. Björk’s Biophilia and The Flaming Lips’ “Do You Realize??” both took on this grand idea with massive musical arrangements and, in Björk’s case, created entire multimedia experiences to try to grasp the idea. González’s universe feels much more self-contained in comparison. He draws instead from the life all around him, whether that be nature or basic human interaction. He’s not trying to make sense out of stars; he’s more interested in these tangible things. This isn’t exactly new territory for González. On his last solo album, 2007’s In Our Nature, he explored evolution and naturalism. Back then, he centered himself on progress; this time he’s more or less admiring the view.
The nature imagery begins on the opener “With the Ink of a Ghost”, in which González relates walking through trails in the mist over peaceful yet haunting guitar tones. On “The Forest”, he dotingly describes the rain and mountain landscapes. He’s so caught up in the beauty of everything that he neglects the bad things, like a forest fire or cracks in a bridge. A flute wavers around his cooing vocals.
Despite taking a smaller look at the universe, this is actually his densest solo work yet. Having been focused on his band Junip, it sounds like he’s become more comfortable with fuller instrumentation on his own. Alongside his trademark whispery voice and fingerpicked acoustic guitar, he employs guitar overdubs and more percussive elements. One of the highlights of coming to a new González record is marveling at his guitar virtuosity. That’s all here again, but these slight new additions to his sound rival his dexterity. Having self-produced the record, he was able to maintain a certain level of rawness with these recordings. Strings buzz and ring throughout every track. When the drums come in, they feel large and demanding. His voice is hazy, almost like a speck in his own musical universe.
Rating 9.7/10





Tracklist:
01 With The Ink Of A Ghost.flac
02 Let It Carry You.flac
03 Stories We Build, Stories We Tell.flac
04 The Forest.flac
05 Leaf Off ／ The Cave.flac
06 Every Age.flac
07 What Will.flac
08 Vissel.flac
09 Afterglow.flac
10 Open Book.flac


Summary:
Country: Sweden
Genre:Indie-Folk
Styles:


Media Report:
Source : CD
Format : FLAC
Format/Info : Free Lossless Audio Codec, 16-bit PCM
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : ~622-755 Kbps
Channel(s) : 2 channels
Sampling rate : 44.1 KHz
Bit depth : 16 bits