Review : Stars of the Lid ...And Their Refinement of the Decline

Stars of the Lid and their Refinement of the Decline

The new Stars of the Lid album is a subdued yet emotional affair.... Spanning 6 beautiful sides of vinyl or available on 2 compact discs (with a different album cover), Kranky records' #100 really has it all. Combining the ambient atmosphere of Brian Eno with the rich feeling of Tim Hecker's latest music, SOTL use a richer orchestral palette than on previous albums; from high overtones to grating guitar swells, backwards violins to bass bellows...

"Refinement" is dreamy, like all SOTL albums, and feels like a sweet somnambulant stroll through a pastel-colored park with the sun shining brightly, whitewashing everything and blinding the corners of your vision. It has to be the best Stars of the Lid album to date.

Organic organ and string layers develop drone bases which help to create a richer sound than any purely "electronic ambient" album could ever hope for. It really sounds like the best aspects of every good ambient album I've ever heard, with a true classical sensibility... I hear echoes of Harold Budd and Brian Eno's "The Pearl", Eno's "Discreet Music", Tim Hecker's "Harmony In Ultraviolet", Earth's "Hex" album, Satie, and more.... which adds up to an incredible total sound.

Whereas I feel that Tim Hecker's "Mirages" album has a distinctly nocturnal sound that is paradoxically "not sleepy", "Refinement of the Decline" is comprised of diurnal sounds that are at the same time very "sleepy." If that makes sense....

It is definitely familiar Stars of the Lid territory, but within that territory the listener suddenly encounters new places-- melody plays a much greater role, and there is a slightly unfamiliar edge ocassionally... Grainier and sharper sounds exist and sometimes emerge from within the soft, smooth, pink ambient cloudscapes.

All the aforementioned elements come together to float loosely in a delta wave-filled aquarium from which Adam Wiltzie and Brian McBride carefully pluck, assemble, and restructure to create this masterpiece of an album.... A masterpiece for SOTL standards, but also for modern music in general.