A year and a half ago, I concluded my review of AZAR, the sophomore album from Athens indie pop group Venice Is Sinking, with the following words: “Despite its faults, AZAR certainly showcases a band with a keen ear for harmony and a willingness to push musical boundaries. I can only hope that future releases will find this band honing its strong points.” It’s an object lesson in the limits of critical speculation (or maybe just in the limits of my own critical speculations). AZAR was a ponderous, atmospheric chunk of chamber pop, rife with layered melodies and orchestral flourish. Sand and Lines, by contrast, is a stark, stripped-down affair, recorded in the now-defunct Georgia Theatre with only two microphones and no overdubbing. If anything, Venice Is Sinking took hold of the “strong points” that I singled out in my last review and chucked them into the waste basket, yet they’ve ended up with a record far more compelling than anything I could have envisioned for this band’s future.
The conceit behind the album makes comparisons with The Cowboy Junkies’ legendary Trinity Sessions inevitable. Like that formidable ancestor, Sand and Lines finds Venice Is Sinking exploring the roots of American music, particularly country, by sprinkling covers of Dolly Parton and Waylon Jennings amid twangy originals like album opener “Sidelights” and “Lucky Lady.” While the resulting album isn’t quite a statement on the level of Trinity, it’s notable for the amount of beauty it spins from such humble material. Whereas many bands use minimalist production values to hide their paucity of new ideas beneath swathes of tape-damage and feedback, Sand and Lines sounds as crisp and polished as any full studio effort, but gains immediacy from the live setting.
There’s plenty of good stuff here, but two songs are worth calling out for special attention. The first is “Bardstown Road.” It’s probably the simplest melody of the entire album, the instrumental backdrop consisting of little more than single-kick bass drum, two shakes of a sleigh bell, and the almost ambient hum of a church organ. The song builds toward a big-group vocal refrain at the end, and the strained quality of the band-members’ overlapping voices captures everything that’s wonderful about how this album was recorded in its final bittersweet minutes. The other MVP track on the album is their reimagining of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene.” By snatching the bass line from Black Sabbath’s “Planet Caravan” and grafting it onto the song, they effectively suck all the bounce out of Parton’s tried-and-true concert staple. In doing so, they lay bare the clawing desperation at the heart of the narrative and call into question the societal values that have reduced the female protagonist to such a state (and on an only tangentially related point, holy shit, check out her pants).
While Sand and Lines runs the risk of getting lost in the shadow of The Trinity Sessions, there’s enough quality music here to make it worth your while. It’s also worth noting that all the proceeds from the album’s sale go to support the owner and crew of The Georgia Theatre, which burned down shortly after the album was finished. If I have one complaint about Venice Is Sinking, it’s that I’m still not quite sure what they actually sound like. Where AZAR found them bursting with big ideas and lavish arrangements, Sand and Lines is a lateral step into subdued singer-songwriter territory, and I have no idea what they’re building toward or where their next album will take them. Still, if I’ve learned one thing, it’s that any attempt to pigeonhole this band is not just futile, but self-defeating. Thanks for keeping me guessing, guys.
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