12. Evan Caminiti - Dreamless Sleep (Thrill Jockey)

 It's not always easy to predict what an artist's solo career will be upon postponing, parting ways with, or just taking a brief detour from his or her famed group. In the case of Barn Owl's Evan Caminiti, mind, it's safe to say that a sudden departure into electro-pop or country-rock was unlikely to be on the cards, and his solo output since 2008 has consistently delivered the kind of spacious drone that was the hallmark of his aforementioned duo with Jon Porras. In such circumstances, picking out where he diverts from familiar territory is almost as interesting as the music itself. He may not have bounded into new worlds as enthusiastically as, say, ex-Yellow Swan Pete Swanson did on Man With Potential last year (man, that was an ace record), but the divergences are there, nestled deep within the layers of sound that adorn Dreamless Sleep. Equally, and probably more importantly, there's a challenge in identifying why Caminiti felt the need to release this album so short on the heels of April's Night Dust.

That question may be a tough one to answer, such are the similarities between both releases. The man must have a lot to express, and he does so with familiar tools: guitar and synth, layered on top of one another in something approaching an “orchestral” style. Where Barn Owl have developed a widescreen, countrified form of guitar-based drone post-metal, heavily indebted to Earth, the music on Dreamless Sleep initially seems centred on the tonality and notes of the synth, even when Caminiti use only guitar, and is infinitely more restrained than that of Barn Owl's epic last album Lost In The Glare, so much so that it feels almost like a reaction to and diversion away from that record. 'Leaving the Island' seeps out of the speakers on ghostly ambient guitar textures which are gradually joined by slender arpeggios that loop around one another in a patient, ghostly dance that is suddenly pierced by a vicious curtain of malevolent feedback. Caminiti's approach may be based on repetition and stasis, but his gradual juxtapositions lend a certain inchoate forward motion, not to mention unexpected dissonance, to the dreamlike soundscapes.

via The Quietus (read the rest there)
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