Establishing the proper context for spinning a Spokane record is tricky: With their labored, creeping melodies and oozing, drone-heavy vocals, it's difficult to acclimate an active, warm-blooded body to the band's aggressively wound-down aesthetic. Winter helps-- think slowly rising walls of snow, landscapes thinning into grey, or puddles quietly settling into dark, cloudy slabs of ice. The view from here: dramatic, formless, and heartbreakingly barren.
The pet project of Drunk's Rick Alverson, Spokane marries docile boy/girl coos, barely-present, chattering-teeth percussion (check a handful of tiny, dull cymbal clicks), blurry guitar, and plenty of big, shuddering echoes. Measurement, the group's fourth full-length, sees Labradford's Robert Donne pitching in on bass, who must be at least partially accountable for Spokane's sudden shift away from the punchy strings and smaller spaces of their first two records, 2000's Leisure and Other Songs and 2001's The Proud Graduates.
More generous listeners might find Measurement's epically unmediated expanse "unsentimental" or "minimalist," but convincing detachment isn't always enough to justify the tedium that goes hand in hand with these kinds of stark artistic decisions. Measurement boasts a few glorious moments (see the creepy, music-box chiming of "An Ideal History", or the cascading strings during the closing minutes of "Temporary Things"), but most of the record's eight airy tracks bleed together into a single blurred image, as forgettable as it is stirring.
Opener "Plotted Courses" begins with a low-pitched buzz, Alverson's whispered vocals hitting like feathers and stirring up tiny puffs of poetry: "Nightstands and cupboards/ And bedside prayers/ Mittens full of snow/ And the promise of warm hands." Layered over timid guitar and pulling strings, and backed by vocalist Courtney Bowles' breathy sighs, the song is a spare, haunting indictment that feels almost unbearably light, far too fragile to take anywhere after it's over.
"Cities" starts with Alverson murmuring on the subtle deceits of time ("The length of days has widened now/ The cost of time seems clear/ And the terms that I had settled on/ Just hid behind the year"), his ruminations bolstered by the pitch-perfect harmonizing of Bowles and some shaky hi-hat pings. Lilting and repetitive, this is Measurement's strongest track, its sonic trickery in perfect line with Alverson's narrative goals.
Cerebral, throbbing, and spineless, Measurement can be a lovely listen, but it's ultimately too hazy to hold up-- depending on your capacity for heavy-lidded brooding, Spokane can seem either transcendent or completely unbearable.
