Chords for Ichiko Aoba - Windswept Adan ALBUM REVIEW

_ _ _ Hi everyone, Winsthony Swept Tano here, the internet's busiest music nerd.
Hope you are doing well, and it's time for a review of the new Ichiko Aoba record, Wind Swept Aiden.
This is the latest studio album from Japanese singer-songwriter and folk artist Ichiko Aoba.
I have been enjoying some of the singles she has been dropping through 2020, as well as
diving into her back catalog in preparation for this review.
In her greater discography, Wind Swept Aiden seems to bring a pretty interesting change of pace.
Key albums in the past haven't featured much more than vocals and guitar presented in a
very dry and naked fashion, which is a pretty daring way of going about things in an age
where there is so little room for silence and subtlety and simplicity in popular music.
But on Wind Swept Aiden, she suddenly goes into full chamber folk and somehow reaches
new levels of serenity in the process.
Maybe some who have been following her work up until this point will see this change of
pace as needlessly busy or even a little too indirect, but I think it'll be clear for most
that this is a pretty captivating direction for her to move in.
With the prologue track on this thing, we kick things off already thinking about the
macro image of the record, how are we going to present this journey on its first step.
I found myself pretty quickly floating on these wavy, droning layers of tones and background
vocals which are laced with sounds of ocean waves, following this some chimey tones and
spoken word passages that are quite hushed.
I love that this track is taking its time and makes it pretty clear the world of sound
you're about to enter into.
As does the following pilgrimage, the first full song on the record, does feel like a
pilgrimage of sorts, there's a lot of movement here, especially in all of the ascending instrumentation.
What Ichiko presents here is a full-fledged folkestra, complete with plucky string arpeggios
and violins, upright bass, woodwinds too.
Her knack for these wondrous melodies is also shown again in the vocals, but it's really
the structure of the song that's the winner for me because it constantly feels like it's
just growing and growing and growing, but not overplaying its hand.
It's cathartic, but not trying to be too showy or really overpower you.
As the track reaches a point where it fades out very subtly, it kind of hits me just how
easygoing and gentle much of the progressions and instrumental performances on this track were.
Next, Porcelain is the one single Ichiko put out in 2020 that actually made it onto this record.
I think it's a decent tune, packed with these ornate, fluttering bits of woodwind, but no
matter how many times I listen to it, the instrumental just reads to me as being like
something from Grizzly Bear's early stuff.
The strings, the subtly psychedelic guitar arpeggios, it all reads to me as being very
like, Yellow House era.
So it does come off a little derivative, even if that influence is unintentional.
I much prefer the tone of the several very short and meditative pieces peppered throughout
the record, like Horro, or the subtly developing Easter Lily, which kicks off with these very
quaint layers of guitar and what sounds like glockenspiel.
The vocals on top of that really sound like they are deeply longing for something.
It's quite moving.
Even more so as more upright bass and strings, as well as background vocals, creep into the mix.
Some of the chord changes on the track are quite jazzy too, which I think is a nice touch.
The following Parfum de Toile provides an interesting change of pace in that it's an
instrumental piano piece with a lot of sudden but fluid changes.
The composition is beautiful, simple, relaxing, but another element of the track that really
stands out are these subtle sonic elements.
There are field recordings of birds chirping, playing throughout much of the piece, and
the piano is mic'd so closely you can hear the inner workings of it, which really adds
to this overall sense of bareness and intimacy that I think is quite pivotal to the vibe
and the feel of this record.
With Sagu Palm Song, we essentially get a bit of math folk in 7-8 time that features
some very driving guitar lines.
And despite it being in an odd time signature, the playing and just the flow of all of it
is so smooth.
Those guitar leads I mentioned earlier are so hypnotic, and choosing to top them with
these closely overdubbed lead vocals that are just gliding cheek to cheek over these
guitars was a stroke of genius.
Then Chino Kaze calls back to some of the simpler and more skeletal times in Ichiko's discography.
Once more its guitar, once more its voice, but it comes off so ghostly and surreal anyway,
especially with how closely the vocals are mic'd and how whispery the tone of the singing is.
On headphones, it's almost like I'm having, like, breath come into my ear or down my neck
as I'm hearing the vocals.
The melodies are really unique on this track, too.
I can understand why the approach would be taken to make this track as bare as it is,
because they're so elastic and they stretch over from one note to the next in really interesting ways.
From here, we move into a very strong final leg for the record.
Hagupit sees the classical influences on this record really bleed into these regal string
arrangements that swell again and again and again throughout the instrumental.
Meanwhile, the vocals blossom into a tone that is quite operatic.
It's a little bold and theatrical, especially considering how humble the beginnings of this
track are and just the tone of the rest of the album.
My only major issue with this track is I wish the finale was brighter as well as longer,
that the end was less inconclusive.
But Dawn in the Aden, though, is maybe the closest thing this album comes to a folk banger.
Vocally, I just think Ichiko snaps on the hook.
On the transition from the verses that feature these speedy, hypnotic, cycling, finger-picked
guitar patterns, we just get hit with this vocal melody that I can only describe as being
like watching all the seasons change over within a matter of seconds again and again
and again, and you're just kind of getting this really quick conception of time and existence.
I also love that the beauty of this melody only seems to be intensified by the growing
backing instrumentation in the second half of the song, too.
Then Ohayashi is a quality instrumental cut whose purpose seems to be to propel us into
a great closer, which is really one of those best-for-last type of [B] moments.
Now, in the case of Ichiko, that doesn't mean, you know, pulling out all the stops, going
crazy, like really blowing the audience out.
Instead, we are getting sounds [Am] and just vocals and a guitar that [F] are so simple and are so bare.
The silence in between the chords, the silence in between [N] the bits of vocal is just deafening.
The track eventually develops into these wonderfully twirling guitar arpeggios, weeping strings.
It's easily one of the most beautiful tunes on the entire project.
Eventually it just kind of fades into the sounds of the ocean, the record effectively
ending in the way that it started with these waves kind of crashing in the mix.
It's just a really serene way to finish things off.
I think it's pretty important to note just how vital the ocean is as a concept and as
a body of sound and abstract to this project.
I mean, we literally have, you know, a figure swimming through the ocean on the cover.
I will say overall there were maybe a few tracks here that paled in comparison to others.
I found the flow of this thing to be slightly fragmented across the track list, but other
than that I am incredibly impressed with so many elements of this project.
The songwriting, gorgeous.
Production, fantastic.
The arrangements, the simplicity, the sound quality, the performances, just so many things
on here are consistently great and gorgeous.
I just can't say enough nice things about them.
I'm feeling a light to decent 9 on this one.
Transition, have you given this album a listen?
Did you love it?
Did you hate it?
What would you rate it?
You're the best, you're the best.
What should I review next?
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