Wayfaring Summer by Arborea

Named after a species of trees, Arborea comprises Buck Curran on acoustic, slide, and electric guitars, flutes, banjo, and vocals, along with Shanti Curran, who sings lead and plays banjo, percussion, guitar, bowed strings, and ukulele. Their songs are bathed in shimmering harmonics, spectral slide, and positively spooky banjo. The songs also evoke a kind of mysterious quality, in which you are never quite sure what the songs are about, but they seem to touch a place in your soul that instinctively understands.

TERRASCOPE

Take a handful of politically sharp lyrics, hone them on a pedal-driven sharpening block in the lea of the old tumbledown barn until the point shines through, set them to melodies so intimate they sound like firelight whispers and moody, atmospheric instrumentation that soothes like a bubblebath and the result is Arborea. This ethereal duo of Buck Curran (who majors on guitars, bowed strings and vocals) and Shanti Curran (vocals, banjo and percussion) hail from Maine, USA and musically hail from a similar gene-pool to Marissa Nadler, especially, and the Appalachian folk musings of the Spectral Light & Moonshine Snakeoil Jamboree (or indeed any one of the several outfits the godfather of psych-holler folk, Timothy Renner, cares to adorn). There’s also a touch of classic British folksong bubbling through like blobs of methane emerging from a witchy well: ‘Beirut’ for example is pure Vashti Bunyan, at once heartbreaking and visceral. The title song ‘Wayfaring Summer’ is an instrumental tour de force of beautifully paced acoustic guitar with a banjo hovering around and through the melody like a moth drawn to a light. ‘River and Rapids’ could easily be a Charalambides outtake, psychedelic acid-folk peddling shadows, shades of meaning and feeling others could never express in words let alone a web of stateley electric music, while ‘Alligator’ finds Shanti murmuring seductively, implying and evading with a coiling, smoky vagueness, and ‘Dance, Sing, Fight’ finds the couple evoking sublime hallucinations in both vocal and instrumental splashes of lightness and shade.

Two-thirty am and I feel like going for a walk amongst the trees. So that’s why they’re called Arborea. Magic you can visit, again and again. (Phil McMullen)

POPJUNKIE

Album of the Year - Arborea 'Wayfaring Summer'

It's a bold claim, but one I'm willing to stick my neck out on. I won't hear a better album than this in 2006. The best new record I've heard in years, Arborea's 'Wayfaring Summer' is a bona fide masterpiece. 10 tracks of absolute genius, containing the tender beauty of Nick Drake's 'Five Leaves Left', the intimate scratchy picks and slides of the Reverend Gary Davis, the other worldy qualities of British acid folk, and a breathtaking originality completely Arborea's own. Buck and Shanti Curran have created a wonderful album that needs to be heard by anyone with ears.

'Rivers and Rapids' is equal parts psychedelia, Smithsonian field recording and backwater folk. Shanti's voices trips in and out over a strange bowed noise that unnerves and settles simultaneously. 'Alligator' is the sound of the sexiest country/folk you've ever heard. Shanti purrs, siren like, leading you down by the water for white magic and fire-light mischief. You will be completely in love with Shanti by the close of the song, and Buck's sensual instrumentation only furthers the sass.

Each song feels incredibly intimate and contains cathedral volumes of space. The feel of each track is superbly varied and paced, yet somehow manage to feel like they've been unearthed in the vaults of an ancient Corinthian church.

'Shagg Pond Revival' is subtly off-kilter, with Shanti becoming the chanteuse once more. However, there is more to Arborea than seduction. 'Dance, Sing, Fight' sees both singing (something that Buck should do more frequently by the sounds of this) in perfect union. The dying notes of the chorus from Shanti's lips are so sweet that it's impossible to resist. The stop/start lyrics glide through yet more fabulous music, and should their be a single, this would be worth considering. Failing that, the stand out track from the LP is the heartbreaking Beirut which sinks deep into your memory on first listen. The lyric "I hear the sound" rings true as the song goes straight to your heart and doesn't let go. A truly wonderful piece of music.

For fans of folk and/or country, this album is absolutely essential. It holds British folk as close to its heart as 1920's country and blues. Many have tried to fuse them before, and failed, but Arborea have found the perfect marriage and developed an incredible, ethereal beauty that leaves them light years ahead of the pack. To say that only folkies would like the album is to do it a disservice. There is enough to appeal to anyone. Listen to 'Warfaring Summer' over and over and over again, and new motifs and melodies reveal to the listener in each sitting. This is an LP that this writer really can't get enough of. Incredible, breathtaking and perfect.

Buy Arborea's 'Wayfaring Summer'. You'll wonder how you lived without it.

-Mof Gimmers (PopJunkie) http://www.popjunkie.tv/

PYSCHEDELIC HOMESTEAD

Pyschedelic Homestead, Belgium, Gerald Van Waes

Wayfaring Summer (US,2006)****

Colourful shades with berries, calmy sitting down in a protected area, where there's nothing to prove, this duo succeeds to create music and a new folk form in their environment in the same way like the Appalachian music was developed in a social and traditional form. This is much sweet-moodier. While aware of what's happening in the world (wars, misunderstandings about differences of populations,..) Arborea provides peaceful wishes from the spring muze deep-in-the-woods. Musically we hear acid-folk visions with tiny melodic improvisations based upon evolutions of looped melodic tunes made from sweet folk guitar pickings mostly, or rhythm guitars, banjo, and a bit of slide guitar..with a few handclap-like rhythms (1,2), and songs, which are completely in balance with the soft freedom aspect of the mood improvisations. Singer Shanti has a very beautiful delicate folk/singer-songwriter voice, which also in duet, harmonizes perfectly. The album succeeds in creating its own unique atmosphere that is nature and human friendly. Recommended !

FOLK RADIO UK

"How often do you come across something so unique and so original that you are just lost for words? When I heard Arborea, I didn't listen to anything else that evening. I didn't want to spoil that atmosphere you get when you hear something that moves you deep down inside.

I loved it, it was beautiful..." -Folk Radio, UK

Arborea is currently receiving airplay from independant and college radio stations in New Orleans, New Hampshire, Maine, San Francisco, Belgium, and the UK!

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