Sentiment is Claire Rousay’s self-professed pop album, and in comparison with the abstracted sound collages of earlier works marks a delicate change of tempo for the experimental Canadian-American artist. “Pop” may appear a stretch, however these are area recordings with a strong emotional centre, the soundtrack of somebody unspooling in actual time. “It’s 4pm on a Monday and I can not cease sobbing,” intones visitor Theodore Cale Schafer on the opening observe – and the stage is ready.
Rousay’s personal vocal is tender however robotic, like uncooked emotion fed via a machine. A lot of Sentiment took form in solitary lodge rooms, and a sense of confinement lingers whereas she conducts a psychological post-mortem of failed interactions, jealousies and self-inflicted solitude. Lover’s Spit Performs within the Background is “an apology tune” for driving others away, set to twinkling midwestern guitar.
Emo? In all probability. However there are not any cathartic singalongs within the album’s downbeat cello or swelling drones. Its relatability stems from one way or the other managing to recreate the particular texture of loneliness: conversations simply out of earshot in W Sundown Blvd; the scattered birdsong and faint automobile horns of Sycamore Skylight, suggesting hours ticking by when you stare at a ceiling. These fragments of sound is likely to be snatched from on a regular basis moments, however drive dwelling the sensation that life should be occurring elsewhere.
