All Music Guide
Sun Kil Moon is a new band project fronted by Mark Kozelek of the Red House Painters. Given the composition of Ghosts of the Great Highway, it's difficult to see how it will all turn out in the end given that Kozelek is in the role of singer, songwriter, guitarist and who knows what else, while the band sports two drummers in Anthony Koutsos (also formerly of RHP) and Tim Mooney ex of the American Music Club and the Toiling Midgets, as well as bassist Geoff Stansfield who came from the ruins of Black Lab. There's a string trio present on the album as well as some minimal use of keyboards, but the propulsive sounds here are guitars, drums and Kozelek's haunted, Neil Younginflected voice. Fans of RHP's later work, such as Songs For A Blue Guitar may be prepared for the material here…but then again, maybe not. There is a decidedly languid pace here that is not as mopey as RHP, and the melodies are more pronounced and out front, purposefully intertwining with the layers of guitars and stri...ngs. Lyrically, Kozelek is as obsessed with memory and the romance of it as ever. In "Glenn Tipton" the opening track, Kozelek compares the blows received by Sonny Liston and Cassius Clay, the preference by fans for one Judas Priest guitarist (K.K. Downing) over another (Tipton) and Jim Nabors over Bobby Vinton contrasted with his own memories of his father watching late night movies on TV as he observes himself doing so, and finally the death of a friend who owned a donut shop. An acoustic guitar is the sole accompaniment this nonsequitir tune needs through its verses before a 12 string, organic percussion and a bass enter the middle. The lyrics may not add up, but they evoke the notion of nostalgia, the ache of time's passage, and the dreams of what might have been. "Carry Me Ohio," with its slowly rung electric guitars, dual tap kits and stripped to the bone bassline is a lexicon. Side by side narratives of broken lovers and Kozelek's boyhood years in Ohio turn in on one another to the shimmering drift guitars and a limpid pulse. There are two versions of "Salvador Sanchez" is straight from the Crazy Horse riff book. Kozelek tells a heroic and heartbreaking story of the champion featherweight boxer, the "magic matador" who died at the age of 23 in an auto accident. The guitar solos, open and wind and the drums usher in the great textured feedback in the bridge. "Duk Koo Kim," appeared in a different version from Cameron Crowe's Vinyl Records label earlier this year. Here it's over 14 minutes; a swirling kaleidoscopic instrumental with strings, xylophones, guitars and drums everywhere. It's a dream cycle that has its roots in the most brilliant and dynamic psychedelia and charts a panoramic vista of lush textures and towering sonic waves. "Si Paloma," with its acoustic guitars piled on top of one another, and mandolins thrown in for good measure, is its mirror image, all bright, sprightly and shiny, like a full on mariachi band playing Big Star. The disc closes with another bout of mirror logic in "Pancho Villa." The cut is simply a gorgeous acoustic read of "Salvador Sanchez," given the different arrangement and the placement of Kozelek's voice in themmixnot to mention his changing of accents in the lyrics, it's a different song, hunted and haunted by its predecessor, sending the record off in a mist of myths and legends, where memory is as present as the moment one lives in and as distant as whatever it took to get there. The bottom line here is that Kozelek's aesthetic with Sun Kil Moon may not be radically different than his RHP project, but it is moving, graceful, and consciously beautiful. - Thom Jurek, All Music Guide Read more Less
