“Low sets mood on cold, rainy night,” The Daily Cardinal, October 24-26, 1997

[My first published article.]

Since their 1995 debut, I Could Live in Hope, Low has garnered favorable press for its delicate approach. One unfortunate comparison likened the band’s songs to “the imperceptible movement and pristine beauty of ice encrusted rivers.” But what such a narrow focus overlooks is the tension of Low’s music; tension that results not simply from delivering songs with the same deliberate tempo and sparse accompaniment, but from oblique and deceptively compressed lyrical statements, sprawling crescendos and tenuous vocals. Inhibited as they are, Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker have adopted an unlikely vocal technique, suspending notes over several bars and leaving themselves nowhere to hide within the desolate framework of their songs.

Low is not hip or trendy. The band’s music does not fit neatly into any current vogue. Some of the band’s songs take a while to get where they’re going — one song occupies almost 15 minutes of their last disc. It seems as if Low has been building a following with the same patience with which they strike every solemn chord.

It appears to be paying off. Last winter’s Madison show was played in the Catacombs Coffee House, while Thursday night, they nearly filled the Pres House chapel upstairs, a setting that fully complemented the band’s space and sound requirements. The dreary, damp night outside provided a fitting subtext for the evening.

After three LPs and a pair of EPs, the second of which the band is touring to support, Low has remained true to its inceptive design, which now seems less a gimmick than a purpose. If anything, Low has expounded upon the audacious formula. The tracks on Songs for a Dead Pilot, the forthcoming EP, include a reworking of the Low composition “Be There,” with droning synthesizer.

“We added a keyboard because somebody told us they were hip,” Sparhawk told the Pres House crowd.

Opening act Mick Turner, guitarist for the Australian instrumental trio The Dirty Three, proved a resourceful instrumentalist, adding melodica and harmonica to his many layers of ambient guitar. Turner set the pattern with his first song and barely deviated from that course in his 40-minute set. However, as one selection proved indistinguishable from the next, and each one proceeded down its disjointed path, one began to wonder if this set wouldn’t have been best confined to Turner’s basement. With the use of dynamics and repetition, Turner occasionally created a compelling aura, but these moments came too far between.

© 1997
Stephen Andrew Miles