Glissando aren’t ones to hurry anything. Formed in, 2002, it wasn’t until 2008 that they released their debut album proper, the daringly quiet and monumentally slow-burning ‘With Our Arms Wide Open We March Towards the Burning Sea’ (although the compilation of EP tracks, ‘Loves are Like Empires’ appeared the year before). Four years on, and after the duo’s working relationship hung in the balance for a while – and not for the first time – Glissando return expanded, reinvigorated and with another finely-crafted work of nuance and suspense in the form of ‘The World Without Us’. It was certainly worth the wait.
‘The World Without Us’ is considered, measured and clearly conceived as a whole, a succession of movements that lead the listener down a series of winding paths toward secret locations. ‘Still (I)’ and (II) bookend the album. A distant crackling ambience slowly fades in and after a disquieting, brooding start, finally blossoms into a majestic piano-led instrumental. Between these two complimentary counterpart pieces, long, meditative instrumental sections dominate, weaving mystical, ethereal scenes with carefully constructed layers of sound that hang like mist above a calm but dangerously deep lake.
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When the vocals do enter, Ellie May Irving’s vocals are at their spine-tingling best, especially on the haunting title track.
Elsewhere, her voice intertwines with Richard Knox’s to create not so much a harmony, but a powerful single voice that carries immense emotional weight, even when half-buried beneath sweeping soundscapes and evocative strings that surge softly yet forcefully, as on ‘The Long Lost’. ‘Companion’ is darkly compelling and hangs on a single piano note for an eternity.
After ‘Embers’ tapers over the horizon on a slow, leaden drone, ‘Still (II)’ reprises its opening counterpart, only this time it realises a full ten-minute duration and features a heartbraking, spine-shivering vocal over the moody strings and a dolorous drum that slowly unravel.
‘The World Without Us’ is an album to ponder, to explore and to completely immerse oneself in.
Glissando Online
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