Plume Giant’s debut LP, released yesterday and available on iTunes and Bandcamp,
is an emblem of both musical coalescence and personal growth.
The mellifluous trio, made up of Eliza Bagg
SM ’12 (violin, vocals, harmonium), Nolan Green ES ’12 (guitar, vocals, harmonium) and Oliver Hill BC ’12 (viola, guitar, vocals), continues to excel at
everything that made their “Plume Giant EP” unique yet recognizably
excellent. However, the new LP, “Callithump”
also experiments successfully with different types of songs while still
developing and expressing a signature sound.
“Callithump” also makes impressive use of
the multiple available articulations on its instruments — violin, viola, guitar,
harmonium, tamborine or the occasional horn. In “B-Side Baby” alone, for
example, the violin and viola play strong chordal elements, the main melodic
lines, secondary melodic fills and echoes, and plucked accents and
articulations. The voices themselves are rhythmic instruments, especially
effective when they enter at different times and trade back and forth.
Some songs recall tracks for the first EP. The
bleusy viola lines of “Kensico Dam” bring to mind “Black Cat,” and “Wait it Out”
falls somewhere between “Fool Hall” and “All of it Now.” But these songs, like
the rest of the album, add something unique with a few surprises along the way.
“Wait it Out,” a single released in July, uses
a steady, rhythmic grove with a coherent bassline to build and then maintain
the energy throughout the song. Playful fiddled tunes in between vocals revive
a celebrated technique of “Fool Hall,” while the lively buildup to a strong chord
that signals the chorus adds an even greater drive that carries the listener
eagerly through the song. The song’s light nature questions the future without
agonizing over it, the lyrics refreshingly real without becoming overdramatic. This
sets a tone for the entire album. The lyrics on “Callithump”, which strike a
balance of playful and emotional, often give the listener a sense of what the
song is about, without making it obvious.
While in some songs traditional
verse-chorus-bridge-outro (with appropriate repetitions) patterns can be
discerned, the album’s compositional structure does not constrict itself to a
template. Each song’s structure is whatever best suits the story it tells or
the musical fabric it weaves.
Plume Giant begins to reach into other styles
and makes them its own. Oliver
explained that the first half of the LP is made up of more “deftly composed”
songs of different American styles, whereas the second half “opens up and
mellows out.”
In “We Got it Made,” a happy-go-lucky number
that adds some jazzy elements — with horn and harmonium to boot — inserts some
of Plume Giant’s signature vocal harmonies to add a unique touch to an
otherwise simpler, carefree song. “Birthday” begins with more of Dido feel that grows from an Eliza solo
to a fuller Plume Giant sound. “Before the Sun” sounds more country before the
harmonies and fiddle lines (thankfully) kick in.
The group’s ability to harmonize has been a
consistent strength, and “Callithump” makes ample use of sustained chords,
suspensions and extended ternary harmonies (mmmm add six chords). For dramatic
effect, the instruments cut out to highlight the three voices on certain
chords.
Consistent with the trio’s down-to-earth
demeanour, “Callithump” doesn’t shy away from throwing in some quirky treats. “Old
Joe the Crow,” a lighthearted tale of a crow that incorporates a lot of onomatopoetic
“caw caws” and “tweedle deets,” exemplifies this theme. Spinning off their
fun-seeking souls, Plume Giant has allowed performances of this track to inform
the finished product. After introducing Joe’s wife, Janette, the singers randomly
pipe up “Janette!” During a particularly dramatic solo of the group’s soprano
belting out a low melody line about Joe (a fantastic example of Plume members stretching
themselves in new ways), the backup shouts “Sing it, Eliza!.” Before the final
chorus of extended crow sounds, Nolan chimes in a “Whoooooooo!!!” The song culminates in a coda of cawing.
The unexpected keeps the record fresh. A
break in an anticipated moment (just before beat two) of “We’ve Got it Made” or
a Charlie Parkeresque instrumental flare that is intangible and everywhere for the
bridge of “November,” grabs the listener’s attention as if it were in danger of
slipping. (It isn’t.)
Plume Giant used a variety of drummers in
addition to Yalies Timothy Huntington Ulysses Gladding aka THUG SY ’14 on euphonium,
Matt Griffith TC ’14 on clarinet and Jacob Paul SM ’13 on trumpet to round out the
instrumental sections. Longer, more involved instrumental bridges could be an
interesting direction for future Plume Giant numbers.
The band used kickstarter to raise ten
grand in October for the album and for a few music videos, coming soon, and the
members worked with a New York freelance production engineer to coproduce the
record. Overall, production came out clean and professional with one or two minor
snags.
In “Back Porch,” for instance, a short song
towards the end of the LP about carefree, sexual exstasy, the an incoherent outro
leaves the listener a bit frustrated and confused. The use of harmonium
throughout the number is a strength of the song, but when it enters again at
the end after an instrumental section has already tapered off and faded, the
listener is jolted by a clunky line that starts louder than the previous fade but
also dies off. The song would have benefited from a smoother transition and
fade out, or a different compositional choice entirely. By contrast, the
distorted rock-style intro to the song was very well done, a not-so-obvious
decision for a folk song intro that fit well and was carefully executed.
The production expertise that comes with
multiple albums will happen for Plume Giant, an ensemble that, during its time
at Yale and after graduation, has come into its own, asserted its own musical
flavour and continued to stretch its own limits. The trio’s spirit shines
through in “November,” the emotional apex of the album that recalls the
intensity and concentration of “Tuesday,” from the EP.
And while Plume Giant would be hardpressd
to duplicate Tuesday’s soft yet dramatic, harmonic buildup in its wordless
chorus, the slower buildup throughout the entire song of “November,” the
delicacy of its vocal textures, and the complexity of the emotions they portray
are unparalleled.
It’s as if the song is teetering on the edge
of a curved blade and too much or too little at the wrong moment would cause
the entire thing to fall apart. “November” starts with Eliza’s voice and light
instrumental backing, just to emphasize certain certain vocal motions and to
keep the song from stagnating. Then, just as timidly, Eliza is joined by the
others and the experience begins to slowly build. By “how your breath hung in
the air,” most of the listener’s breaths will be hanging as well.
Halfway through the track, as the verse
repeats again, it starts to pick up more with “I remember, I remember”
compelling the group to accept the memory and tell the story, even if in
metaphors. The song ends with the ominous line, “How sad to lose something in
the snow,” followed by a chilling augmented chord and a winding down that just barely
releases the moment.
Music and lyrics compliment each other
harmoniously as they share and shift the spotlight onto each other, just as
Eliza, Nolan and Oliver revel in a shared musical energy that passes among them
while never truly leaving any individual.
E
tribus unum.
Z
