The Fresh & Onlys guitarist Wymond Miles cultivates an arch air of high drama in his solo songwriting. On releases like 2012’s Under the Pale Moon* *and 2013’s Cut Yourself Free, he combined baroque compositional tics and faux-English intonations, suggesting a muted Robert Smith backed by the world’s most chilled-out post-punk band. His best songs cultivate a perfect and patient balance between darkness and buoyancy, and the insinuating aftertaste lingers.
The songs on* Call by Night* evince the gentle intimacy of the instrument upon which they were written: the piano. If his prior material befit festival stages, this album’s austerity cries out for tiny venues so cramped that you watch beads of condensation form upon and streak down the performers’ water bottles. Some of them have the quality of madrigals: “Protection” establishes Night’s aesthetic: pronounced, theatrical talk-singing; vocals wreathed in echo. Undulating acoustic strums, tom toms, and slicing strings accompany the oblique advice he doles out on the title track, which borders on the avuncular. On the sloshing, epic “Divided In Two,” Miles sets fire to family trees. The staggering Americana gem “Rear View Mirror” and stately anti-ballad “Stand Before Me” very nearly justify coining the phrase “post-Malkmus drinking song.” Elsewhere, lumbering kiss-off “Summer Rains” makes a hopeful, widescreen case for new beginnings.
Despite its traditionalist instrumentation, its slightly retro reference points, *Call by Night *is an album striving to stand apart, to take deeper root. It’s a statement of intent that serves to elevate Miles above his back catalogue. In these modest-seeming songs, he touches on the strange exhilaration we occasionally feel in moments of sadness and uncertainty. It's a feeling we’ve become increasingly familiar with in society, and from his modest perch, Miles brings it to brilliant, stinging life.
