Viewed as a spiritual successor to The Shoe Wearer’s That One EP, Echoes the Horizon takes the content and ideas thereon and seems to elevate them in all respects.  The production is crisper, the songs have more variety, and the sound seems more refined and dialed.  I’m very pleasantly surprised with what strikes me as a folky aspect to this album.  The vocal delivery is floaty, the guitars lean towards more acoustic timbres, even when they are electric.  Well-placed instrumental songs (and passages) also help vary the tone and pacing of the album.  Echoes the Horizon starts with a grouping of lively and diverse songs, then goes into the esoteric warble of the Minds and Echoes, right after the midpoint of the album.  Afterwards, it soothes you with the lullaby of City Lights before delivering one more grandiose finale with Fading.  The movement of the entire album is very cohesive, and the productional touches and flairs of the songs give them a shared element while also giving each song its own distinct identity. 

~I Fall Down But You Fall Too~

        Solid opening track.  Showcases the production and different styles that appear throughout the album.  The different rhythms and tempos of the song keep it compelling before it even hits the first verse, which almost halfway through the song (awesome bassline here).  This song almost gives off a folk vibe, with the acoustic-flavored guitars and youthful, hopeful vocals (did he just say the c-word?).  Definitely leaves me eager to see where the rest of the album will go from here, which parts of this song will be focused on and explored more.  Versatile opener.

Suggested Listening: Surfin’ New Jersey by Slaughter Beach, Dog (mainly for intro riff)

~Earth Tones~

            Oh yeah… The “groove” of the album – jangly and relentless.  The whole song is very light and carefree; the verses float by simultaneously at breakneck speed (drums and bass are unwaveringly locked in) and at a lethargic crawl (drawling vocals lazily alternating from higher to lower lines).  The vocal style still retains some folkiness from the prior track which adds to the buoyancy of the song.  Chorus and following solo build the delicate yet pleasant atmosphere (cymbal goes *clang* *clang* *clang* !) and provide nice structure variance.  Nice song to daydream to…

Suggested Listening: Cars in Space by Rolling Blackouts C.F.

~Stankbrain~

            The production is a standout feature of this song.  The chorus features warbly effects on the vocals, echoic swells on the guitar (or could it be a synth..?), and there are in-the-pocket piano runs in the second verse.  “Features” may even be the wrong word to use for these flourishes: nothing is ostentatious, the song delivers itself cleanly and plainly, and these little auditory tricks only tickle your ear on an almost subliminal level.  This tight production and song structure culminate to some short but diverse jams in the last minute and a half of the song.  Seems like one of the more fundamental songs on the album, which taps into the true essence of Caught Sparrow’s musical style and identity.

Suggested Listening: Shellstar by Deafheaven while on ketamine

~Rooster~

            A big step into experimentalism - I get a sense of being really immersed (or more so swept up in) the passage of time: the reverbs of the guitar and rimshots echoing into eternity, the repeated reverse-swooshes in the chorus fleeting from the brain every several seconds, even the very synth solo towards the end sounds like it has almost been forgotten by time.  This all adds up to some of the most psychedelic and ambitious production on the whole album.  Especially as compared to Earth Tones, for example, an effective counterpoint to some of the more upbeat stuff on the album so far.

Suggested Listening: Holding Out For You by Pond

~Eclipse of the Programmed Mind~

            Ah yes, the maniacal arpeggiation of the synth…  Awesome use of polyrhythms, the 6/8 of the synth and the straight 4/4 of the drums provide a constantly off-kilter feeling to this song.  This wonky backbone stays throughout the entire song, which fills in the space with some extremely ambient recordings of guitar-noodles and exotic cyborg birds (??).  This structure and style basically gives the impression of being stuck in some endless vortex of bewilderment.  An equally good song to daydream to as Earth Tones, but perhaps these daydreams would be a bit more unsettling…  Not at all that that is a bad thing. 

Suggested Listening: The scene in Spongebob where The Flying Dutchman throws Squidward into the Fly of Despair (just kidding it’s actually Jammed Exit by Thee Oh Sees)

~Echoes the Horizon~

            And we have blast off.  A wonderful song to be nestled between the two instrumental jams.  Lulls you into a false sense of comfort in the first 2 minutes, then completely augments the impression with the demonic vocals.  They are very brief (totaling around 30 seconds of songtime) but are so characteristic that they give the entire song its tone.  Even after the vocals subside, you still feel as if some maniacal entity is chanting at you somewhere within the endlessly looping guitar and psychedelia.

Suggested Listening: Seemingly by The Sea and Cake but through an oscillating room fan

~Awakening of the Unbounded Mind~

        I appreciate this song for being the one to ground me after Echoes the Horizon.  This is the sister song to Eclipse, and serves this purpose very well by taking an opposing stylistic sound.  It is very soothing and mainly easygoing, and even more contrast can be found in the similarities between the two songs: Awakening is another instrumental with a constant backing of drums and bass, but much more synchronized and calming.  This song also has many psychedelic touches in the way of gradual swells and phasers, but these are overall more musical and thus pleasant on the ear, as compared to Eclipse’s ethereal guitar chimings and field recordings of unidentifiable species of birds.  Awakening and Eclipse create a nice swirl of dichotomy, with the enigmatic Echoes tucked mysteriously in the middle.  Standout portion of the album.

Suggested Listening: In Mind by Real Estate

~City Lights~

            In its own eerie way, one of the best songs on the album.  I like where it was taken from its demo version (truncated) and the performance of this song is just incredible.  A(nother) stylistic departure from the rest of the album, leaning more into the more alternative side of fulk/indie/emo of the album as a whole.  I find it interesting to note that there is no percussion whatsoever on this song.  Even for its delicate structure it has moments of variety (a piano!?) which give this song a lot of character and ponderous emotion.

Suggested Listening: The whole Amnesiac album by Radiohead

~Fading~

            Wonderful transition into this song from City Lights.  A tight, short closer that atmospherically recaps the entire album: it is phasey, synthy, airy, altogether subtly psychedelic.  The acoustic(-sounding) guitar once again introduces an almost folky element to the nonchalant chords as they shimmer over the pool of splash cymbals and moist basslines.  A good song to watch small bugs crawl around to…

Suggested Listening: Cover Me (Slowly) by Deerhunter if Cover Me and Agoraphobia were functionally switched on the album