Artist : KEPLER
Title : Attic Salt
Cat# RESCD017

Format : CD Album Jewel Case
Label : Resonant
Barcode # 0666017126623

Release Info :

The term “Attic Salt” refers to a delicate, refined wit; this proves an apt description of the sharp, and often darkly funny lyrical depictions heard on Kepler’s latest release.  Armed with lush, but unfussy arrangements and stellar playing, the band easily shifts between feedback-drenched laments like “Broken Bottles Blackened Hearts,” the wall-of-sound orchestrations of “the Bedside Manner” or New-Wave-meets Motown stompers like the “The National Epithet.”

Kepler began in 1997 with three gentlemen (Samir Khan, Jon Georgekish-Watt, and Michael Sheridan) who formed a band devoted to playing slow, quiet, and intense music.  Jeremy Gara, at that time best known for his drumming, joined the group as a guitarist in 1999.  Kepler’s first lineup released an EP, several singles, and two full-length records in North America and Europe and toured extensively over said territories, gaining a loyal following garnering favourable reviews in some of “fairly important” music magazines, including Mojo (U.K.), Pitchforkmedia (U.S.), The Wire (U.K.), NME (U.K.), Rockzilla (Italy), the Gap (Austria), Stylus (U.S.) and Exclaim! (Canada).  They were played on legendary U.K. BBC DJ John Peel’s radio program, were profiled and recorded live for CBC Radio’s “Brave New Waves” (Canada), and were the subject of a lengthy profile on VPRO Radio’s “de Avonden,” (Netherlands).

2003 was a busy year, seeing Kepler open for Montreal’s godspeed you Black Emperor! in Europe and mounting a successful tour of Canada.  That busy year saw the band determined to break out of the strictly slow and quiet mold and take advantage of a new songwriting focus.  Former drummer Mike Sheridan left the group in early 2003.

In the spring of 2003, they entered the studio of their longtime friend, producer Dave Draves (Howe Gelb, Kathleen Edwards, Julie Doiron, Wooden Stars, Snailhouse) on the day of the invasion of Iraq.  The band had little idea of what their record would sound like, as they had at the point of recording, never played any of its songs with anything resembling a full band.  Guests Mike Feuerstack (lapsteel), Mike Dubue and John Tielli (vocals) dropped by to help the process along. 

Six months later, the record was finally finished.  In the fall, of 2004 Jeremy was asked to join the Arcade Fire, just as their soon-to-be massive “Funeral” was released.  Samir called up Jon to pull the plug on the band, but Jon persuaded him to continue.

Mike Feuerstack (guitar and lapstee) and Mike Dubue (percussion and keyboards)  formally joined the group, and longtime Ottawa musician Jordy Walker (drums) followed.  New songs are being written.  And so it goes.  

Reviews :

I must confess that when I first looked at the joined-up-writing cover, I thought that 'Attic Salt' was an album sponsored by heat-resistant material manufacturers Kevlar; Under water, it's 20 times stronger than steel! But no, it is infact the new missive from Canadian slllllooooowwwwccccoooorrrrreeee outfit Keplar - with 'Attic Salt' (which sounds like a euphemism to us...) their third long player. Having recently lost a member to the bottomless pit that is the Arcade Fire, 'Attic Salt' seems to have shouldered a new maturity, shunning the overt posturing of 'Fuck Fight Fail' in favour of a cushioned approach which is lulling without ever threatening to become soporific. Opening with the vibra-guitar, 'Broken Bottles, Blackened Hearts' sees the Cannuck mob etching a lovelorn platter of alt.americana (think Wilco) from the slo-mo environs cast up by lyrics like "back in the day when I tore my own jeans, I never thought I'd hear myself say, now that I'm much older than I ever thought I'd be, it might be time to switch side". Not much on paper I grant you, but a cracker in the ears. Fact! Upping the bpm, next track 'Thoroughbred Gin' sounds not unlike something you'd expect to hear from the bottom of Matt Elliot's glass - with a disingenuous tale of Monday night drinking given a anti-spin by the jaunty accompaniment, whilst elsewhere the likes of 'My Other' and 'Rented Limousine' sound not unlike Nirvana - but syrup slooooowwww. Tough as nails! BOOMKAT

Here in 2005, beauty remains under siege-- it's the new boring; it's all tied into hidden power structures; it's hard to dance to and resists innovation-- yet the concept of beauty, and our perception of it, persists. No matter how abstracted and censured it becomes, few would deny that, say, the oceans are beautiful. In a musical climate where beauty is often disregarded or located in asymmetrical euphony, bands like Kepler are clinging to an older and more concrete conception of beauty-- one that hinges on order, balance, and tradition. Like its namesake, the Canadian ex-slowcore (now just songcore) troupe arrays celestial happenings in elegant orbits, making songs that fit perfectly into circles like Leonardo da Vinci's Vitruvian Man.

If you replace "slowcore" with "post-rock" in Kepler's biography, the band's trajectory is parallel with Karate's (if compressed): Attic Salt is analagous to Pockets in its basic sonics and its triumphant, post-deconstructive lucidity. Here's "Broken Bottles, Blackened Hearts", a stately tide of lambent piano chords, lush reverb, and hushed cymbals ebbing and flowing below Samir Khan's tweedy (Jeff Tweedy, that is) vocals. Here's "The Bedside Manner", loping with the graceful yet muscular fluidity of a trotting horse. And here's "Rented Limosine", with arpeggios refracting through lapidary percussion like light through a prism. Here's an album that locates its force in its artisanal skill, not in its theoretical or innovative dimensions, and if it's not a dying breed, it's certainly an endangered one.

This is not a call for art to return to Middle Age, or even neo-classical, values-- I place a high premium on art's capacity for innovation and social commentary. Rather, it is a call for a reassessment of the value of beauty, disabused of Judeo-Christian overtones but in full possession of its divine symmetry, at a time when its cultural relevance is dwindling. To reject the beauty of order is to reject the natural world. At the end of the day, Kepler's music is beautiful, like the sea is beautiful, and while we might not know exactly what this means, to disregard it wholesale as a biased cultural construct is to throw out the baby and the bath. It is also a deep loss to another confounding yet lasting, embarassing abstraction: The human spirit. PITCHFORK

Kepler are yet another excellent Canadian band and this is their third album. Poised somewhere between Nada Surf and Elbow, Kepler make beautiful, yearning music that shades its eyes against the cold, steely dawn.

'Attic Salt' is sanguine, a description far more apt than say, deep or dark... and it sums up life's surprises in much the same way way as the old Peggy Lee song, 'Is that all there is?'. The honky-tonk plonks and a guitar twinkles for opener 'Broken Bottles Blackened Hearts', which is followed by the deceptively chirpy 'Thoroughbred Gin'. Both songs have a deep sense of disillusionment coursing through them, stirred by the hollow promises of rock 'n' roll or sweet company.

The only time a rebellious, straight-up, antisocial stand is made is on 'Days Of Begging' - "Now I carry a knife or a screwdriver / 'cause I never know when I'll have to stick a motherfucker." Even here, if you're not really paying attention, you'd be forgiven for thinking these words are non-controversial or possibly even tender, such is the cool blooded delivery. It's surprising then, to find couched here a bona fide single in 'You Must Admit'. It's 60s syncopated soul at heart but it's a heart seared by insincerity, taking us back to bad sex territory, à la Arab Strap.

But what is Attic Salt?

According to the Nuttall Encyclopaedia no less, this dinky phrase refers to a "pointed and delicate wit", but best consider Attic in the sense of Ancient Greek Attica, because humour from a tiny roof space it ain't. But it is deeply beautiful, haunting and memorable. DROWNED IN SOUND

Disclaimers are the last thing that you want to read before embarking on reading a record review. They’re silly, usually pointless, and reveal a complete lack of professionalism on the part of the writer. If we were really doing our job, we wouldn’t need them at all. Most print magazines don’t bother to use them, but that’s because they’re professionals and can look past the sometimes incestuous business and personal alliances that creep up in their brand of hype mongering. This isn’t that sort of disclaimer, though. I don’t know Kepler. But I do love them.

Which I think is an important disclaimer to share because I don’t know if anyone else loves them. Or, for that matter, should love them. It’s just they’re one of those types of bands: the type that sounds so personal that you begin to question their actual quality. Is it that they just strike so deeply that they transcend any sort of critical distance? Or is it that they strike so deeply their inherent quality? Does it even matter? So, to sum it up: I’m not sure that Kepler is great at what they do in the genre that they inhabit. And I’m not sure where Attic Salt falls on some sort of personal ranked listing of their releases. And I’m definitely not sure what other people make of this band that don’t already love them. But I have been converted. And that’s enough for me.

Attic Salt is the band’s third album after their also Troubleman Unlimited released Fuck Fight Fail (the slo-core debut masterpiece that evoked both Low and Mogwai in equal measure) and Missionless Days (a country-soaked album that grew with each listen). Attic Salt takes after its most recent predecessor in that the country-rock influences hang heavily over the proceedings: lap-steel, a lumbering backbeat, and despondent minor keys all play prominent roles thoughout. The latter two elements, in conjunction with bassist/singer’s Samir Khan hushed croon, also contribute to the vestigal slo-core sounds that continue to inform the group’s sound as well.

This is, of course, all in spite of the fact that the group’s line-up has turned over nearly completely since the last time out. Losing drummer Jeremy Gara to The Arcade Fire after completing work on the album, the group (then consisting merely of Jon Georgekish-Watt and Khan) recruited a number of local musicians—Mike Feuerstack, Jordy Walker and Mike Dubueto—to help out and, eventually, join the band. Despite the fact that they know make up a majority share of the membership, the record is still defiantly a Kepler one. Each of their contributions seems to be in deference to the feel that Kepler has cultivated throughout its history, except now the sound is fuller and, for lack of a better word, heftier.

There are important changes, though. On album highlight “The National Epithet,” we have back-up vocals cooing along with Khan adding a soul feel to the already upbeat, interlocking guitar and organ work that is finally overtaken by a powerful drone by song’s end. “Days of Begging” and “Broken Bottle Blackened Hearts” recall the band’s earlier records, though, in the former’s case an almost bluesy guitar solo takes over for a moment—something that never would have happened in their earlier days when it seemed that every note was a sacred gift. “You Must Admit,” conversely is a bar-room lament that uses the same sort of wordless vocalizing to fill in the pre-bridge in an unexpected manner.

But if there’s anything that’s unexpected, it’s the fact that Kepler has done the dreaded thing and actually matured as a band. Whereas Fuck Fight Fail was a two-note record (Loud. And a whole lot of soft.) and Missionless Days was equally as static (Country-rock that played it pretty much by the numbers), Attic Salt combines both elements ably and strikes out in important new directions, so much so that the band is considering changing its name. Whatever that name is, I’ll be listening. STYLUS MAGAZINE

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