Talking to members of Venice is Sinking is nothing like listening to their music. Daniel Lawson and Lucas Jensen are animated and lively during our conversation and they flit from topic to topic, often leading to interesting tangents. They end up steering the interview and we talk less about their new record and more about the band Okay, the divergent paths of once akin Superior, Wisconsin and Duluth, Minnesota, and the double standards faced by women in rock music.
Their latest release AZAR, in contrast, is a blissfully mellow, dreamy auditory journey through varying soundscapes and atmospheres. At first listen it seems unobtrusive and deceivingly simple, but discerning ears find that this is a record about layers. Each song is thick with diverse, collaborative rhythms and multiple, entwined melodies and instruments. In fact, some of the best, climactic moments on the record are not when another layer is added, but rather when a layer is taken away — a brief suspension before plunging back into a palette of sound.
“Ryan’s Song” is the standout track on the record and its unsettled energy mirrors its lyrics about being dissatisfied with your surroundings. According to Lawson and Jensen it’s a song about moving to change your life and finding out that location does not necessarily influence situation, finding out that moving wasn’t what you thought it would be and, consequently, moving back to where you came from. The video the band filmed for the song follows suit — throughout the course of the song the band members are moved, unpacked, rearranged and moved again.
There are many nice moments on the album. “Wetlands Dancehall” sparkles at its end with an almost music-box like effect and “Young Master Sunshine” has the band making great use of a 1940s wire recorder to get vintage sounding strings and organ. On “Sunbelt,” James Sewell incorporates some wonderful jazz trumpet playing before the track shifts into a lively style change that works extremely well, especially as an under-current to Karolyn Troupe’s beautiful saccharine vocals. The four instrumental “AZAR” tracks interspersed throughout the record help to provide both cohesion and breathing space to a record otherwise teeming with subtle details. Unfortunately the downfall of the record is that the lyrics often get lost in all the other intricacies. If talking to them is an indication, this band has a lot to say lyrically and it would benefit them to give their lyrics the same careful attention in the studio that they do their music.
I really dig this! It feels good.