The Ginger Envelope occupy a very shifty middle ground, one that fluctuates between unabashed indie rock and down-home, smooth alt-country. On latest release Edible Orchids, they go from lo-fi, drawling pop cuts (“Caretaker”) to pedal-steel ballads (“Night Sweeping”) without blinking an eye — these two tracks actually bookend the album, the perfect symbolism for this hazily discreet disc. Without ever losing sight of their influences, the group succinctly coalesces these two genres to create a comfortably homey album: one that recalls home-cooked meals and the Sunday morning paper.
Inevitably though, what The Ginger Envelope lacks is a tick that makes them immediately memorable. With said middle ground comes an amount of ambiguity and, well, middling. Edible Orchids places you exactly where you expect to be. It doesn’t strike with any heart-wrenching blows, nor does it have a penultimate high. It lingers along, as the group masterfully crafts gentle soundscapes, layered behind softening, singable melodies.
On the more-alt-country-than-not “Failsafe,” The Ginger Envelope lazily ride through the musical motions as they sing, “Every year I remember the same things/ Every year I grow a little less dumb.” Not altogether banal lyrics, they fail to affect even the most attentive and invested listener. But The Ginger Envelope seem to sing these lyrics as though they’re deeply personal and specific to themselves rather than overarching ideas that countless other musicians have already sung — and more convincingly to boot.
Similarly, on “Kites,” one of the most indie rock tracks on Edible Orchids, the group’s more frantic pace — one of the few changes in speed on the entire album — can’t mask the muddled, mundane lyrics: “Finally the king, he got bored/ Left at nine and with a kite in hand.” From there, the track devolves into lines containing random images that are sung in an indeterminable drawl.
And yet it’s difficult to say that “Kites” is markedly worse than any other track on Edible Orchids. They are all so similar in composition and execution — even with the differing, mended styles this monotony seems to persist — you’re rarely left singing a line or humming a melody after the record’s close. And that’s the real issue with the disc: The Ginger Envelope fail to truly take any risks and, in turn, are left with a collection of songs that do very little but play in the background. It seems as if they had gambled a little more with melodies or composition, they might end up with a couple of weaker tracks but also several that are truly astounding.
That’s not to say that on their next release, The Ginger Envelope need to get all John Cage, but there certainly needs to be more introspection and risk-driven pieces. As it stands though, Edible Orchids is a great disc to throw on when reading the Sunday paper or when Mom is baking cookies in the kitchen.
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