Send "Desertshore " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Pitchfork |
 San Francisco's Desertshore ostensibly took their name from Nico's 1970 album, the one where she began writing her own songs and exerting more control over her sound and style. A decidedly more personal than commercial album-- with a few songs in German and one sung by her daughter-- Desertshore was not a hit, at least not on par with her debut or her albums with the Velvet Underground, but it continues to attract as many listeners as it repels. Similarly, Desertshore the band represents guitarist Phil Carney's first step away from sideman status, after a stint in Red House Painters and a few appearances on albums and tours by former Painters frontman Mark Kozelek. Carney favors patient, shimmery repetitions of notes that establish tone instead of melody, and the group, which also includes pianist Chris Connolly and a rotation of percussionists, trades in glacial instrumentals that echo the sepiatone reminiscences of the best Painters tracks.Desertshore, however, do not represent a conscious attempt by Carney to escape that band's orbit; it's less a solo or even a duo project than it is a collaborative entity. Kozelek signed the band to his own Caldo Verde label and contributed to their 2010 debut, Drifting Your Majesty. Now, almost inevitably, Kozelek has more or less joined the group: On their follow-up, Drawing of Threes, he plays barely noticeable basslines and adds lyrics and vocals to six of these 10 songs. It may be as close to a Red House Painters reunion as we will get-- at least until Kozelek reconvenes the original Sun Kil Moon line-up. As a result of Kozelek's participation, Drawing of Threes will sound deeply familiar to anyone who's heard any of the bands mentioned so far. His voice remains distinctively hollow-eyed, his vocal melodies sound as eloquently understated as ever, and the guitars ring in a darkly ruminative mood that sets Desertshore in the same 3 a.m. universe as Old Ramon and Ghosts of Great Highway. In other words, Kozelek dominates this album. Of the four instrumental tracks, only one-- the standout "Matchlight Arcana"-- exceeds the two-minute mark, while the others sound like soundtrack interstitials consigned to the album's second half. It's an odd dynamic: the guest plays the lead, the name band becomes the support. Whether that speaks to Desertshore's modesty or timidity is never quite clear....full text |
| Avclub |
| Guitarist Phil Carney has played alongside Mark Kozelek off and on since the latter’s Red House Painters days, so there’s nothing that unusual about Kozelek sitting in with Carney’s band Desertshore for its second album, Drawing Of Threes. Except that Kozelek does more than just sit in; he sings and plays bass on the first six of the album’s 10 tracks. The remaining songs are all instrumentals—just like all the songs on Desertshore’s 2010 debut album, Drifting Your Majesty—but since Carney and his co-founder/pianist Chris Connolly favor dreamy soft-rock, halfway between Windham Hill and sadcore, Desertshore doesn’t sound too different from a typical Red House Painters or Sun Kil Moon album. If anything, what distinguishes this record is that it sounds livelier than anything Kozelek has put his name on in years. Granted, there’s nothing on Drawing Of Threes as elegantly composed as “Half Moon Bay” or “Tonight In Bilbao” (from Sun Kil Moon’s Admiral Fell Promises and April, respectively). The Kozelek-sung material on Desertshore’s latest is looser and slighter, with repetitious lyrics and simple, swaying patterns. Cases in point: “Turtle Pond,” a slow, gorgeous drifter that evokes the feeling of bobbing in the water and clearing the mind of all thoughts, and “Randy Quaid,” which amiably lists ways to spend an idle day in the San Francisco Bay area. The closest Drawing Of Threes gets to complexity is “Mölle,” which moves from an extended jazzy intro to a hushed-but-insistent body, followed by three brief instrumentals that play like successive codas. Carney and Connolly are primarily using Kozelek here as another instrument in their concise soundscapes. But for fans of Red House Painters and Sun Kil Moon who’ve been frustrated by Kozelek’s recent retreat into one-man-band-ism, it’s a pleasure to hear him working with other musicians again, and with a richer, more expressive sound. Here’s hoping that Kozelek carries that openness with him to his next project—and that he keeps Carney and Connolly on speed-dial. ...full text |
| Desertshoreband |
| The former Red House Painters/Sun Kil Moon guitarist Phil Carney now leads the band Desertshore, and he’s tapped his former boss in both those bands, depression-rock godhead Mark Kozelek, to sing and play bass on new Desertshore album Drawing Of Threes. We’ve already posted one track from that album, “Mercy.” Now here’s another: The similarly crushing six-minute wallow “Diana.”...full text |
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