Boxhead Ensemble

Quartets is one of those wonderful albums that sits perfectly astride multiple moods, spaces and times. Michael Krassner of the Lofty Pillars convenes fellow travellers from bands such as Smog, Wilco, Pinetop Seven and Terminal 4 to this place that wipes clean musical memory. The Ensemble quietly shape elegies for that hint of sunrise after a dark winter night. Pieces drift in and fade out like phantoms with an austere sadness tinged with a knowledge of lightness and beauty. We are transported to imaginary places made from memories of Scottish highland, Canadian prairie, open sea. And yet we are in this room full of quietly phased guitar drones, bowed cymbals, muted timpani, creaking chairs and enough strings to suspend a bridge, magically.