Golden Retriever and guitarist Chuck Johnson have joined forces on the Thrill Jockey album Rain Shadow (out May 25th). Today the trio release a teaser track, clocking in at nearly an album side of new music, titled “Empty Quarter.”
Vibraphone, piano, and glissando strings open the seven-minute long post-rock track “Sunsight.” The band, Golden Retriever, has always incorporated contemporary classical sounds and gestures into its music, but a surprise is the jazzy cast of the bass clarinet solo that follows the introduction. It appears in the foreground; the aforementioned textures are then backgrounded alongside keyboard glissandos.
The original nucleus of Golden Retriever is the duo of Matt Carlson and Jonathan Sielaff. But as our friends over at Tiny Mix Tapes point out, here they enlist a whole chamber orchestra to assist in the recording of this single, which appears as the last track on Rotations, Golden Retriever’s latest full length for Thrill Jockey (out July 28th). The result isn’t merely a thickening of textures, but an enrichment of ideas.
Seer, Golden Retriever’s latest, is out on Tuesday via Thrill Jockey. Check out their space pop meets minimalism concoction “Flight Song” below.
