I'll admit it first up, I thought Non-être was the band name due to a personal disdain for band names that are far longer than album titles. Turns out that I was wrong on not one but two counts as not only is "Non-être" the album title but Beneath Wind and Waves is a one-man mellow melancholy dealing project by Portland-based singer-songwriter Shawn Lawson Freeman.
With a janglish guitar sound over sombre lyrics like "America loves a trainwreck", it's hard not to think of the likes of Red House Painters. That America is a huge continent and often filled of nothingness comes though ihttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifn the barrenness of Transference" It's not only melancholy as there's a theme of self-absorbtion, which is something most of us are guilty of at sometime or another.
"Persephone" features the vocals of Stephanie Schneiderman and due to its subject matter, music and alternating vocals brings to mind Prefab Sprout's "The Ice Maiden" and the song is definitely one of the highlights on the album.
"98" is one of those weird songs where a male voice takes on a female narrator. I found this baffling due to a female voice being used in other songs and it's tough to tell whether the song is taking on the euthanasia debate.
Lyrics like "You're the sugar in my tea" definitely won't win everyone over and confuses the hell out of me. There's a number of songs that would have been better served with brevity as listening to a number of songs on Non-etre is the aural equivalent of running a marathon due to their length.
2/5
Band Website
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