Cassette Review // Human Flourishing "Patterns of Welcomes and Partings"

 

https://humanflourishing.bandcamp.com/album/patterns-of-welcomes-and-partings-2

As soon as this starts you can hear the dreamy guitar.   Tones drop in and then the vocals come in as well.   This has a very 1980's/early 1990's sound to it, like it's part of the soundtrack to a movie where the kids must win a ski competition to get their mountain back.    Yet, at the same time, this could certainly be an anthem from an early 2000's indie rock band.

Dreamy acoustics bring about the second song, which might be somewhere between Flaming Lips and The Wrens.  Electronics come into start the next song in a way like wild ping pong balls of electronics before the distortion kicks in like a rather heavy Weezer song.   It's dreamy still, as the melodies may not come in a traditional way but they are still here.

"In the Mouth of Flowers" begins as this psychedelic folk song but there are also these emo type of tones in here.  On some level, it reminds me of The Lyndsay Diaries and just that whole 2002 vibe when everyone wanted to sound home recorded and personal.   This song, however, very much drifts off into a lot of different sounds.   There is a large musical bridge here which even contains birds.

On the flip side, we open with this slow melodic ballad.   It is one of the purest songs you will ever hear and then distortion kicks in to accompany it as well.   Through a howling guitar and blazing electronics, we groove into the second song on Side B.   This song is rather trippy and then just breaks down into these primal screams and acoustics.  

The next song, "Albany Beach". starts with this feeling of video games, like something I would've played on the NES such as Final Fight before bursts of static come through.   This takes us into a vocal loop which becomes manipulated into sounding different ways on "Crud Mucker Lullwhip".   There is also a haunted aura about this song.  

"Slowly Dying" is a more desolate song with whispers in it which say "Slowly dying / just like me".   In some ways, we're all slowly dying but I suppose if you're an optimist you're slowly living.   "Yr Turn" ends this cassette with an acoustic guitar melody that has singing in the rounds.  Lyrics such as "You're wasting time" should leave you compelled to make the most of your life after listening to this cassette, even if that just happens to be listening again.