Click here to view the original article

Auburn Lull
Cast From The Platform
[Darla; 2004; Michigan Space Rock]
Rating: 8.5
darla.com

Michigan’s Auburn Lull returns after 1999’s excellent “Alone I Admire” (reissued by Darla in 2002) and early press reactions are on the spot for this new album, which indicate a deservedly and candid warm welcome back. Once associated with Michigan’s fledgling space rock scene (Windy and Carl, Fuxa and Asha Vida), the member’s of Auburn Lull still retain the magic that made their early releases such a pleasure to listen to. The focus of the new recording remains as in the past, using spatial ambiance as it’s main axis; drums, guitars, synths, bass and voice extended into a never ending westward gaze.

A track like “Deterior” willfully serves the purpose of making everything stand still and suddenly lift the all around into a direct shoot out into the stars, leaving all else behind. The rest of the album, like the opener, “Building fifty”, rely on progressive schemes that are rich in sound, ambiance and slow calculated rhythms. If there is only one small quip about this album is probably Auburn Lull’s reluctance to rock out in full saturated shoegaze style, as they maintain their steady pose throughout the album’s eleven tracks.

Recorded in every conceivable ample space, “Cast from the platform” succeeds in portraying rock music in a context that goes beyond dreampop and far out bliss outs. The pleasure is in the detail of every sound, finely crafted and suited for this borderless geographic setting that reaches deep inside. Andrew Prinz’s (of Mahogany fame) lends a hand as the fifth member of the band, carefully adding the aesthetic brushes in sound, image and design. This altogether results in a very satisfying old fashioned musical packaged experience, like it used to be, before lo-fi mp3’s took hostage of our compact disc players. [Ejival]