Pitchfork

Birds are as convenient a metaphor as any for High Places' resplendent, fluttery indie-pop, but the title of "Canary"-- from the Brooklyn duo's forthcoming self-titled album-- might just as well be a reference to the Canary Islands, where the recently on-repeat El Guincho has been making his own "space-age exotica" (his words). Happily, the move to album length hasn't pulled High Places' Rob Barber and Mary Pearson (full disclosure: Pearson is the sister of a former Pitchfork employee) down from the watery dream-world level they occupied on last year's High Places EP, where ambient drones, syncopated homemade rhythms, Martin Denny tiki gods, and girlish vocals sharing guileless confidences can all co-exist, and you can pile up so much loose change your guy gets an extra life. Except from the sound of it, while you were playing Wii, these two might've been in their living room making music. That sense of casual intimacy puts a nice human face on even the drips, drops, rattles, burbles, rings, creaks, scratches, and hums that form the hypnotic opening minute of "Canary", before the lo-fi beats come in. Pearson's words are as clear and unguarded as her voice, expressing the kind of naïve sentiment (childlike wisdom?) people too rarely speak, let alone sing: "Please come back, friends/ We really messed up." Not yet, they didn't, but I'll gladly accept a return visit anyway.

[from 03/07 - 09/07; available from eMusic as part of eMusic Selects]