Send "Kurt Vile " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 The songs on So Outta Reach were technically written during the same sessions that brought us Smoke Ring for My Halo, Kurt Vile's still-resonant 2011 breakthrough, but the boundaries separating Vile's recordings, at this point, are growing irrelevant: His discography is starting to blur into one long, drawn-out sigh. Listening to hours of Kurt Vile, you get the impression that he once discovered the Neil Young lyric, "Though my problems are meaningless/ That don't make them go away" from "On the Beach", decided to lie down in it a while, and just never left.Like other cultishly obsessive songwriters, however, Vile manages to repeat himself without strictly repeating himself. Images and phrases cycle through his lyrics like tumbling socks in a dryer-- he mumbles the phrase "two packs of red apples" on both "Red Apples" from 2009's God Is Saying This to You, and again on Halo's "Runner Ups". His releases often feature alternate versions of the same song, which happens here with "Life's a Beach" and "(so outta reach)", the second a faint echo of the first's muted shuffle. These are the sorts of subliminal tugs that map out the contours of a universe, and Vile has carefully built one with small tools-- his mutter, a bottomless cavern of reverb, and glimmering tangles of guitars-- and painted it a dozen shades of steel-blue and watery gray. So Outta Reach, then, is a dispatch, another stop along a journey, and it's as good a place to tune into his frequency as any. "The Creature", the opening song, spins out another fragile variation on the wearily bemused blues he's perfected. His acoustic fingerpicking remains stunning, a narcotic blur of voicing that recalls his friend and former touring partner Jack Rose. Like Rose, or like early Elliott Smith, Vile's playing retunes your hearing to the limitless possibilities of the plain old acoustic guitar....full text |
| Bbc |
| As anyone who’s been following the career of this Philadelphian singer/songwriter can attest, Kurt Vile is a prolific sort. Already he’s released four albums, three EPs and a pair of singles since surfacing as a solo artist in 2008 (not to mention two EPs and an LP while a member of The War on Drugs). His fourth EP, So Outta Reach, collects together six tracks written for this year’s seductive Smoke Ring For My Halo full-length (indeed, they’re appended as a bonus-disc to the deluxe pre-Christmas re-release that album’s enjoying), and recorded shortly after it was completed. If this suggests that So Outta Reach is a compilation of off-cuts considered not-good-enough for the album proper, well, that’s kind of what it sounds like; certainly there’s nothing here to match the hypnotic lilt of Peeping Tomboy, or the heavy-eyed ache of Baby’s Arm, two of Smoke Ring’s highlights. But if you’ve already succumbed to Vile’s ragged charms, you’ll know this taste, once acquired, is addictive. The Creature revisits the bucolic intimacy of Smoke Ring, all reverb-laden finger-picking and Vile’s affecting slacker mumble – seriously, Kurt matches Dinosaur Jr’s J Mascis when it comes to moving you with his sleepy, slurred vocals, like he cares so much he hasn’t the energy to sound like he cares. Downbound Train welcomes Vile’s backing group The Hunchbacks to the stage, its blue-collar tale of hardship lent a Springsteen-esque heroism by their thrumming chug. They similarly gild the loping strum of Laughing Stock, rumbling like thunder behind Vile’s croak of "some smoke to take the edge off", and lend a widescreen depth to the slight but unforgettable melodies of It’s Alright. The EP closes with two takes of its finest song, Life’s a Beach, its koan-like lyric of "I’m so outta reach / yeah, life’s a beach" something to ruminate on while bathed in the easy-going wash of its chords and Vile’s echo-bolstered vocal. On the second take, Vile and his Hunchbacks sound like a lo-fi Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, who similarly made such winning melodic rock sound utterly effortless. Perhaps a lesser entry in the grand scheme of his discography, So Outta Reach sounds like Kurt’s hardly even trying. But this laidback attitude – and the audacious quality of the songs that seem to find him with such ease – is the key to much of his abundant charm, and even working at half-speed he delivers....full text |
| Prettymuchamazing |
| Philadelphia based singer songwriter Kurt Vile has been having a breakthrough year in 2011, recently coming off a long tour promoting his second proper full length for Matador Records, Smoke Ring For My Halo (one of our favorite albums this year). The musician, who has garnered comparisons to Bruce Springsteen due to his falsetto and fondness for acoustic driven rock songs, has announced a new EP, So Outta Reach. The EP will feature five songs that were recorded during the My Halo sessions that did not end up making the cut, including a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “Downbown Train.” So Outta Reach — which comes out November 8th — will also appear as part of a deluxe edition of the LP, out the same day. Check out and download the first to surface from the EP, a spacious, acoustic ballad called “The Creature....full text |
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