Quilt – “Held in Splendor” released on the label Mexican Summer,
American folk music is often held as sacred, bound by hallowed traditions both acoustic and spiritual. So it seems almost too easy to name your ragtag, 21st-century folk band Quilt, but it’s difficult to describe this Boston-bred trio any other way, their cloth cut from equal parts the Byrds, Mazzy Star, and the Mamas and the Papas, though the stitches threading their follow up record together are far from linear. Alternating psych-pop textures, radiant Eastern rhythms, and acoustic licks, “Held in Splendor” defies what we typically talk about when we talk about “folk” music.
Maybe when Quilt named the album, they were describing its sound. More mature – and significantly better – that their self-titled debut, “Held in Splendor” is more ornate, more psych, more 1967 than 1966. Though the psych-folk tossback trend of the last few years leaves mixed results , Quilt has more firmly established their sound within the genre. Following thier 2011 self-titled debut on Mexican Summer, Its full of cascading harmonies and billowing textures, punchy rhythms and snarled guitars, wonderful depth and resplendent peaks. Mary Mountain takes hazy Summer of Love memories on a mid-summer road trip in a gleaming muscle car. Tired & Buttered invites Booker T over for an energy-addled jam in the garage. The Hollow twinkles like Fleetwood Mac and Galaxie 500, with sweet singing backed by the lap steel sighs of young acoustic guitar . Held in Splendor is an album of personal poetry , confessions and aspirations”really, these 13 tracks are their own playground, brimming with the sort of unapologetic energy and wonder that turns simple songs into absolute anthems. This has been one of my most played records this last year,
The Fat Angel Sings 