(May 2010) At this point in Hammock’s career, I guess you could say they’ve accomplished pretty much everything they needed to. Majestic, sweeping songs that conjure images of lost desert wanderers? Check. Making Slowdive sound uptempo? Check. Successfully writing songs perfectly suited to waking up in slow motion? Check. Making an ambient album that captures the same drama as their more rhythm-oriented work? Check. Slowing down shoegaze to a drugged, blissful crawl? Check. Outrageously dramatic song titles? Check that, too.
Chasing After Shadows… Living With The Ghosts (breath), Hammock’s fourth album, finds the band treading a mix of the (surprise) dreamy territories they have explored in their past albums. This sounds bad at first, but after actually listening to the album, you start to think, “Does it really matter?” Hammock have never branded themselves as fantastically inventive, nor, I suspect, are they trying to pass off Chasing… as provocative, envelope-pushing Art. No – they’re just musicians reveling in their own, hyperemotional brand of shoegaze, and they’re very good at what they do. What’s remarkable about Chasing… is that it should feel tired and played out, given the similarities between the album and their past work, but somehow Hammock manage to bring new vigor to their tried (but not tired) formula.
Take “The World We Knew As Children,” for example. Look at that song title for a second. What do you expect? Probably a slow, cinematic epic that has hints of nostalgia and pinched longing for sunny, sublime childhood days covered in the sepia dust of memory. Which, as it turns out, is exactly what you get – plaintively strummed guitars, the soft thud of airbrushed drums, and weeping, resigned string arrangements, vaguely suggesting that good memories become great memories in hindsight. “You Lost The Starlight In Your Eyes” works the same way. It’s almost ten minutes long, and the penultimate song on the album – hmm, maybe an achingly gorgeous pillowtalk anthem with an extended ambient outro analogous to, say, two lovers falling asleep slowly? Sounds about right.
This game works for more than half of the songs on the album. Now, with most other shoegaze acts I’d roll my eyes and walk away, but something makes me hesitate with Hammock. Something in the uniformity of their work and aesthetic tells me that they’re not winking at me over their cellos and reverb pedals. Instead, they’re hunched over their instruments, eyes closed, trying to make the most beautiful music they know how to make. If they’re being fully sincere, does it really matter if it seems a tad melodramatic? Everyone gets a little nostalgic sometimes.
All this isn’t really to say that their sincerity renders ‘Chasing…’ impervious to criticism – all it does is take the legs out from any arguments regarding Hammock being “uninspired” or “unwilling to progress.” That said, Chasing… still isn’t perfect. The long (72 minute) running time will come as no surprise to Hammock fans. With each song, Hammock strive to reach the same astronomical emotional plateaus, which is nice (and successful most of the time), but after more than an hour it makes me slightly weary. Certainly the album would have been no worse off if, for example, the bloated “Dust In The Devil’s Snow” was cut, or if some of the longer tracks like “Andalusia” had been edited down to something shorter than 5 minutes. Chasing… remarkably manages to drive the same point home on every song, but the combined effect of those songs might have been more powerful in a more succinct form.
Detractions aside, this is a strong entry in Hammock’s catalog, and it is even more impressive in its ability to make the whole “weepy slowcore on muscle relaxants” thing sound exciting and emotionally appealing. They’re in dangerous territory here, but Chasing… shows how adept Hammock are at conveying their vision of a more beautiful world. The album is a wonderful, sprawling mess, and repeated listens are bound to only uncover the same truth – Hammock isn’t trying to trick you. Hammock is trying to give until it hurts.
Chasing After Shadows… Living With The Ghosts is out now on Hammock Music. [Listen | Purchase]
