Clear space there may be between early and late Drape—Forage staying smaller, up-closer, Presence going wider and higher, post-production lending granularity to instrumentation, yet a unity of tenor and sound prevails.
Continuing to mine a rich opened out post-folk vein
First sighted when debut LP, An Idea and Its Map, piqued ears a decade ago, reaching the dizzy heights of igloo’s Top releases of 2012, Drape unveiled only their third for Infraction, Forage/Presence, earlier this year, itself following up at some distance Let There Water Air. Not the most productive, then, but prolificity is hardly an index of virtue in music, familiarity tending to breed if not contempt then a certain jadedness. More hard-to-get types, the Portland duo’s latest—a double vinyl/digital release with Forage, previously a ltd. ed. cassette (Baro, 2016), on one LP, new album Presence on the other—is a low-light, and, in line with the established house style, slow release in several senses, temporality and semantic resonance in particular, making for a kind of Long Now. Hence the lag…
Forage/Presence finds Drapers, Spencer Williams and Ryan Gracey, continuing to mine a rich opened out post-folk vein with aerial acoustic guitars, piano, woodwinds, femme vox (all electronically treated), plus contributions from Doug McDiarmid (Why?) filling their bucolic ambient spaces. Active since the late 2000s, the group has sonically evolved with each successive release, evolution emblematically embodied in Forage’s twinning with Presence. Clear space there may be between early and late Drape—Forage staying smaller, up-closer, Presence going wider and higher, post-production lending granularity to instrumentation, yet a unity of tenor and sound prevails. While each presents coherently individually, the former’s final track, “Harbor Number,” audibly prefigures development in the latter’s opener, “Flight Form.” While much ambient (or ‘Ambient’) can have a fluffy, unfocused feel, Presence is eponymously there (or is it here?), febrile and suggestive. Guitars ring, voices sing, percussion rattles and hums, above and beyond. A recursive piano motif, insistently lulling, a down-home feel, uncloying. Mesmeric atmo-strata, guitar soars over, beckoning to bliss-out.
In 2012 An Idea… was seen as ‘less space-music, more like space, leaving down the lid for the stars. Neither New Age lull-fest nor doomy drone–sprawl, spooling sonorous squalls and tender timbres from drone-base to bliss-out, and on to post-classical soundtrack strains […],’ (igloo ‘view). The same spirit can be heard, with greater presence, coursing through Forage/Presence. Anorak-y margin note: mastered by Odd Nosdam.
Forage/Presence is available on Infraction [Bandcamp]
