Memphis preview

Memphis
Schubas, Chicago
Wednesday, June 13, 2007

You can take the singer out of the band, but you can’t take the band out of the singer. Torquil Campbell took on a side project to fiddle with while his Canadian collective Stars instituted a respite. The result is Memphis, a spacy, airy outfit along with childhood friend and past collaborator Chris Dumont.

A Little Place In The Wilderness brims with Stars atmospherics and doe-eyed romanticism. This is an album to get lost in the wilderness to — the wilderness of the heart. The album’s 10 tracks are wrapped in a gauzy glaze, like staring out of the frosted glass of a bathroom window. Only silhouettes remain visible, which gives the listener a feeling of displacement and infuses a separation from the material.

“From The Highest Room” features Campbell’s wife reading a poem he wrote years ago against a backdrop of undulating guitars, while “Ghost Story” and its lonely violin unfold like a campfire thriller. “In The Cinema Alone” encompasses the album’s world weary attitude with its chorus of “Dream all you like/you’re gonna end up alone,” while the one bright spot, “Let’s Get Incredibly Drunk On Whiskey,” sounds eerily like The Smiths, both in texture and title. And that’s not saying much, is it?

Memphis open for Apostle Of Hustle.

— Janine Schaults

Category: Stage Buzz, Weekly