THE GREAT AWAKENING

I was going to use the coma analogy but thought that would be cruel, not to this album but to coma sufferers at large. So I'll trot out the more tasteful sleepwalking metaphor. In the 6 years subsequent to the very fine "Jet Plane and Oxbow" , SHEARWATER backed off original material apart from the amorphous "Quarantine Series", and rededicated themselves to BOWIE's Berlin trilogy. The idolatry with latter day TALK TALK remains intact here, and hopefully they can soon wash their hands of it. But in the meantime....

The moral quandary here is whether to wake up the somnambulist, which is generally not advised, especially as I would be doing this for my own sanity not theirs. Like MIDLAKE's "For the Sake of Bethel Woods" only far worse, this stylized, breathy, ultra processed chill, and remarkably undead recording lacks even the vitality of anyone with a pulse between 10 and 20, and I'm including the chuckwalla lizard during a deep freeze. Sure, I think they plug in a drum machine a few times, and the keys sometimes resemble the pedestrian patter of a polydactyl housecat, but I want a bit, a lot more, please.

Apart from the decent ballad "Xenarthran", this is a colossal fail, and to donate 2 stars to its memory is to cheapen SHEARWATER's prior mediocre entries, for which I've suddenly developed a wistful admiration. I've tried over and over, but I've got nothing. "The Great Awakening" is neither, not even close, but here's hoping that the next release truly sees the band emerge from sleep mode long enough to restore their credibility as an original force.

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