Texas-born Jana Hunter, the talented freak-folk guitarist and singer, was the first artist to release an album on Devendra Banhart and Vetiver frontman Andy Cabic's label Gnomonsong. In all she's put out two full-length albums, one EP, and a split with Banhart, alongside contributions to other bands, including Phosphorescent and CocoRosie. Her last release was in 2007, and fans wondered where Hunter had gone until she recently started turning up at venues with a new band. The new group, a foursome based in Baltimore, immerses her elastic alto tone in a colorful mix of electric guitar, bass, and drums, yielding unhinged, dreamy rock with just the right mix of flourish and understatement. This is very much Hunter's band; anyone familiar with her work will hear the parallels between the two acts. The biggest difference between Twin-Hand Movement and Hunter's solo albums is the instrumentation: This album is more about her guitar than her voice, which is absent from a few of the songs. Both projects let their guitars go off and wander, but the lilting country twang seems to have been left behind.
Instead, Lower Dens experiment with a broad range of tones, all in the service of atmosphere. They also frequently stick to lower registers and slower tempos, which at times comes off as too introspective, especially on the instrumental tracks. The same could be said of the xx's debut-- when Lower Dens are at their most spare ("Rosie" and "Plastic & Powder"), the two bands sound similar-- but in place of the xx's foggy sexual tension, Hunter and company share a wider array of emotion. When Hunter's voice appears-- often deep into tracks-- it can sound spent, alluring, hopeful, and exasperated, and the guitars are just as versatile: screeching, whining, twinkling-- they're the show-offs in the band. That said, there is a placid, warm quality to nearly every track, no matter what the guitars are up to. (For this, credit is due to producer Chris Coady, who also mixed Beach House's Teen Dream; Coady turns busy bunches of layers into an elegant bouquet.)
Hunter's deep, smooth voice-- comparable to PJ Harvey's, especially on grittier tracks like "Completely Golden"-- is woven in with the least trebly of the instruments, whispery yet tensile. When it's time for the guitars to show off with elaborate arpeggios, gurgling shreds, and distant, glittery calls-and-responses, she stands back from the mic entirely, or at least gives the instruments, including her own, a long intro. Even when her lyrics are a key component of a song, she can sound (like Beach House's Victoria Legrand) a little lost in the mix, as if the force of the instruments were threatening to blow her away. The rare tracks where she's loudest are just as strong as the others: there's the slight "Truss Me", whose title is a good indication of how slow and loose the song is, and "Two Cocks", a joyous, robust potential single.
Lower Dens appreciate the grimy atmospherics of new wave as much as the dizzy elements of shoegaze, which can make Twin-Hand Movement confusing on first listen. But when variety sounds this good, it's hard to fault a band for sharing so many ideas in one place. The album is primarily about atmosphere: about translating feeling into music, rather than the music serving as a companion to lyrics. When Hunter ruminates about "just a-standing in your pretty presence" on "I Get Nervous", the instruments, playing a long, cozy intro of noodling and heartbeat percussion, are that "pretty presence"-- or the closest thing to it.
