“This isn’t a radical reinvention as much as it’s a refinement; the backing band and its leader have never been better. You’ll rarely hear four players with as much quiet command.”
– www.pitchfork.com
Recorded in the same two week session as AODDOL I by Stuart Hallerman at Avast and mastered by Mell Detmer, Earth’s Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II carries on in the freely improvised, folkloric vein of the title track from their last release. Tape was rolled and spontaneous composition occurred.
Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II is striking in many ways, not least, in the wildly improvised nature of this particular recording. Earth’s songs, Sigil of Brass and The Corascene Dog, perfectly emphasize how the interplay between the foursome becomes even more accomplished as the recording evolves, a testament to the dynamism of this particular line up. Meanwhile, the track, His Teeth Did Brightly Shine, veers further into an entirely other direction, recalling sounds of the great British Acid Folk generation. This new Earth material brings forth some highly original and deeply mesmerizing tones throughout, at times more hopeful and less dark and death oriented than previous work.
Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II is ultimately a new, completely unanticipated direction for Earth, and a very welcome one at that.
The Earth line-up, again, consists of Dylan R. Carlson on guitar and devices (including bass on the track, The Rakehell), Adrienne Davies on drums and percussion (on this release, there is more percussion of all sorts), Lori Goldston (Nirvana, David Byrne, Black Cat Orchestra, Laura Veirs) returns on cello, and Karl Blau (K Records, Laura Veirs, Microphones) plays bass. As with the first part, it again has truly amazing artwork by Stacey Rozich.
Listen!