REDLIGHT

Second album from this good post rock group that dares to step out of the (very) limited boundaries of the genre. The unchanged line-up allowed the band to take up from where they'd let things off in the debut Burden Of Hope, which was pretty straight forward Post rock with a slight Asian twist. This Asian feel was replaced by a folkier atmosphere, sometimes reminiscent of Woven Hand feel is more present, even if the artwork is much more Western- bound (Roman) ruins on this booklet.

Indeed, the group has learned the tricks of the trade with the debut album and now aspires to greater freedom of movement; thus they regularly step out of the allowed post perimeter and take on a few psych flavours, but this still way too shy to make a real difference. Grails does remains a post rock group with all of the rules and the dogma of the genre dully respected , including dynamic moods swings of the bands, especially though Alex's guitars. Most tracks are slow ?starting and feature the usual build ?up/crescendo effect in the pure tradition of the genre, but some songs actually never leave ground zero and remain gloomy (such as Alms)

Not yet a grand album from this Oregon outfit, but I must say I prefer a Grails album anytime over much more prominent and better-known post rock groups