SAND SNOWMAN · Two Way Mirror | CD

Regular edition on cd in japanese style mini album gatefold cardboard sleeve

Background information about 'Two Way Mirror'

There is a particular kind of magic that happens when a record refuses to sit still. Sand Snowman — the long-running project of multi-instrumentalist James Wolf — has been quietly building a small universe of hushed, strange, gorgeous music for years, and "Two Way Mirror" might just be the most beguiling doorway into it. This is progressive folk in the truest sense: acoustic guitars that shimmer like rain on glass, hand percussion that patters and clicks, flute lines that wander off into the fog, and arrangements that keep folding in on themselves like origami. Nothing here is showy. Everything here is deliberate.

What lifts the album above the usual psych-folk crowd is the guest list, and the way those voices are used as instruments rather than decorations. Steven Wilson lends his unmistakable tone to "Faded Flowers" and "Riverrun", and the effect is uncanny — that familiar, precise melancholy drifting into Wolf's warm, woody soundworld. Moonswift and Jason Ninnis trade and share leads across "The Butcher's Hook", "I Spy" and "Neurotic Zoo", giving the record a haunted, communal feel, like a séance conducted around a single microphone. Highlights come thick and fast: the eight-minute "Mirrors", which unspools slowly and refuses to resolve; the miniature "Matryoshka, Muse Of Misrule", all of ninety-one seconds of mischief; and "Kites", which closes things on a note of fragile, upward-drifting hope. It is music for grey afternoons and long walks home, and it rewards every single listen.

For fans of: Steven Wilson, Opeth, Comus, Espers, Trees, The Incredible String Band

Other Versions

LTD. LP LP · Sold out

Track listing

1. The Butcher's Hook
2. I Spy
3. Faded Flowers
4. A Vision On The Green
5. Matryoshka, Muse Of Misrule
6. Mirrors
7. Riverrun
8. Neurotic Zoo
9. Kites

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