Rachel's - Selenography

No, it's not THE Rachels, or just Rachels plural, it's like Rachel's cat but without the cat.  I don't know why either.  In any case, I just tripped over this album a few weeks ago after letting it sit in my CD case for like five years.  I was poking around in Barnes & Noble back when I still had long hair and I heard a song playing which was so interesting that I convinced my mom to buy the album... which I quickly obtained and she quickly forgot.  Rachel's has been around for a while, how many albums exactly I'm not sure, but at least five or six, I'd guess.  This is not their latest - that'd be Systems and Layers, which was interesting but not as good as Selenography.  It is a small chamber orchestra which produces cinematic, beautiful, and sort of haunting and creepy instrumental music.  Sound familiar?  I guess I'm on that tip lately.  In any case, Rachel's has a much more traditional sound than Flim or Max Richter, the other creepy, haunting instrumental artists I've reviewed on late.  The instrumentation is more familiar, but the music itself is no less adventurous.

The opener, "A French Galleasse" is indicative of what's to come.  Swirling piano and guitar gradually give way to more sweeping string instruments and drumming - a motif you'll be seeing more of.  "On Demeter" is the next and longest song on the album, beginning for a while with soundscape-y violins and cellos hovering and wobbling on the edge of sensation.  Eventually they fade away and a curious, mysterious piano melody steps in, once again backed by guitar, and once again giving way to fuller instrumentation - similar structure, but wildly different sound on this song.  "Honeysuckle Suite" is a harpsichord(?) solo track, which goes through three movements, each very different from one another but all having a very classical, even medieval sound to them.  "Cuts the metal cold" is another highlight, the sad little thing.  The final track, "The Mysterious Disappearance of Louis Leprince" is a break from their sound, but is also one of the best tracks and happens to be the one which caught my ear that fateful eve.  A quick, rattling beat and ooming organs underly a strange, sharp-sounding instrument (harpsichord again) beating a strange melody.  It eventually is replaced by accordion, then piano playing the same notes, as the beat is augmented and road noises obscure the instruments.

When I say the music is cinematic, I don't just mean that as a throwaway term.  It doesn't sound like a soundtrack, exactly, but more like there's something that they can see and you can't that's guiding the music.  The eerie opening of "On Demeter," for example, makes me think of a lantern-lit road and a suspicious horseman casting his eyes about, watching for something hiding beyond his circle of light.  It's nice to listen to with your eyes closed, letting your mind wander and fixate.

Here's "On Demeter," and here's "Honeysuckle Suite," by Rachel's.