by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
Glaring Orchid has been in a constant state metamorphosis for the past few years, evolving from the project’s early lo-fi electronic and ambient tinged roots into something fuzzier and more sonically dense (with an awesome cover of Fugazi’s “I’m So Tired” along the way). Atmosphere still plays a large part in their sound, but the Philly-via-New Brunswick band, led by Quinn Mulvihill, have ventured beyond the digital realm of their sound into a dense form of swarming shoegaze and layered slowcore. Working together with Tim Jordan (Sun Organ) at his Blood Red Sky studio, Glaring Orchid’s full length debut arrives fully formed, with equal parts graceful nuance and blaring distortion. The album opener is worth the “price of admission” alone. Mulvihill’s songs favor texture to all out hooks, but there’s plenty to grip onto as the dynamics unravel throughout the band’s glistening album.
While we await details about the record’s pending release, Glaring Orchid offer “Swimmer,” the record’s lead single, a patient song that stutters and glides, led by pinched harmonics and radiant melodies. With a woozy sort of drum beat (courtesy of Sun Organ’s Alex Ha), the progression moves without a sense of immediacy but never lacks structural purpose. There’s no rush at hand, and the song is all the better for it, because when the walls coming crashing down, it feels natural as opposed to the pay off from a mounting sense or predictable tension. Mulvihill pushes from serene to intensity without warning but fluid enough to avoid jarring fractures in the songwriting, it’s an encapsulation of life’s unpredictable nature and reflections of shifting perspectives, the dread inseparable from the beauty. Despite it all, Mulvihill’s sentiment rings out in the repeated “I hope you’re okay.”