Owl - Mille Feuille [Sofa Music]

Put on the circuit via the Norwegian Sofa Music label on April 4th, 2k20 is "Mille Feuille", the latest longplay piece recorded by Owl - a duo comprised of Signe Emmeluth and Karl Bjora, two artists both focused on the fields of improvisation and composition alike. Realised with the help of sound technician Magnus Nergaard the projects debut caters a total of six tracks stretched over the course of 42 minutes, with the opener "Upon Arrival You Forgot Why You Left" taking up approximately half of the albums playtime with a stripped down trademark combination of Jazz and Improv in conjunction with deep, often slightly Ambient-leaning electronic textures as well as clear references to genres like PopAmbient and Post-PostRock, with sometimes brooding granular and modular sequences harking back to the early days of electronic music production as well as playful or even melancholic instrumental parts. This seamlessly glued variety shifting from one musical phase into the next one throughout the opening piece sets the pace, tone and vibe for things to come like the beautifully relaxed, yet somewhat unsettling and fever'ish guitar and flute layers of "On The Lookout", the shrieking FreeJazz meets Noize pulse combo in "Let's Crackle", tender, multi-layered, slightly Balearic PostRock guitars in the 130 seconds of "Paradigm" whilst "Dive Deeper" caters dark, spaced out modular experiments and electric crackles alongside scattered, singular guitar chords and the concluding "Consensus, Time To Leave" waves goodbye in a tender, stripped down and most beautiful PopAmbient meets Post-PostRock fashion with a slightly playful twist which turns this one into our favorite cut on the entire album. Proper good.

Album artwork on Instagram!