SONGS OF GREEN PHEASANT – aerial days

(CD, Fat Cat)

Less playful and more concise, more focused and less spreading in all directions, less lo-fi and more structured and composed – these are the main changes from the first album of Duncan Sumpner aka Songs of Green Pheasant to the new one here. The step from the debut to the so-called sophomore release (a term and idea I usually despise, but here the progress – another term I despise in music – is so obvious, my usual restraints in reviewing seem to flow from me like soft air) has worked wonderfully, showing the rise in level and ability. Take for instance the song “remembering and forgetting”. A carefully composed and even more attentively arranged song centered around a vocal line and dynamically growing to a point were a guitar solo seems fit; and of course it comes. A little echo on the doubled vocals, soft guitar picking and I am getting the desire to search for the genius of Simon & Garfunkel and to taste white tea with ginger.

All the songs, seven in all, on “aerial days” work in this area, some slower and softer and others a little more rhythmical and faster, which means flowing slowly as well, but a little more lively. The atmosphere is almost evangelical in parts but still rooted in a sort of soft psychedelia that I remember from a variety of songs on a 3-album-box called “psychedelic years: the album favorites”. This box included all kinds of songs that were the highlights of albums that as a whole were outstanding, but didn’t feature a hit single per se. A strange concept, bound to fail by idea but still working due to carefull collection and ordering of the tracks, but more importantly, “aerial days” is an album working as a whole better than broken down into single songs as well. Interestingly so, because according to the infos released along to the record the songs are meant to stand on their own, commemorating more or less significant experiences in the life of the songwriter (with the integrated excpetion of being invited to join a cover-project to the anniversary of the “White Album” by the Beatles and contributing “Dear Prudence”). Duncan Sumpner doesn’t hold any misconceptions to his art on top, and with short over half an hour the record has the perfect length to impress the listener.

What’s so remarkable and impressive is the fluttering and glittering atmosphere that seems to lie over the whole of the record. Before anybody mumbles “Loveless” I throw in the picture of the sunshine reflected in bright blue waves on a beach or watching the sky on a wonderful autumn afternoon. Free time, free air, free space, free minds. You might have noticed reading this, that the adjective used most often is “soft” and there is a reason for this: “aerial days” is a soft record. Not like the unfortunate misconstruction of soft rock, but in a more emotional, emphatic way. Dreamlike and sensitive, songs like ambient soundscapes, slowly drifting. In many ways Songs of Green Pheasant is closer to electronic music artists working at their own unique blend of beauty (to name a few recent names: Fourscore, Guiseppe Ielasi, Pendler) than to fellow modern or progressive folk songwriters, which are so hyped up at the moment and to who Sumpner always seems to get thrown to. Maybe the aforementioned Simon & Garfunkel connotations have something to do with that?