We should have written a review of Daughter of the Sea by Rey Villalobos, aka House of Wolves, before now. We previewed the title track back in February, but (largely due to our failings as music writers) never got around to telling you about the entire record. But, that’s about to change, namely because I’ve gone back to the album in the last few weeks, and want to write something about it, belated or not.
The album was recorded with Darragh Nolan at his studio in County Wexford on the east coast of Ireland. As well as the skill and expertise of Nolan, one can’t help but feel that the location itself, consciously or not, had a major influence on the sound of the album. The tracks are beguilingly simple, with a lingering eerie beauty that’s evocative of the surrounding Irish landscape, of foggy plains and craggy dolmens, of ghosts and memories long dead. The songs sound like those of a lonely man pining after ghosts, or perhaps a lonely ghost pining after those left behind.
The album opens with ‘Beautiful Things’ with its elegantly morose piano and air of noirish romanticism. It’s a song about those fleeting little moments, the everyday beauty that we too often miss. Next track, ‘Daughter Of the Sea’, is one of the tracks that feels most indebted to the environment in which it was conceived. In our preview of the single we described the song as sounding like sitting in a “cosy but lonely cabin on a rugged clifftop, somewhere warm and comfortable yet haunted by the the past”. It’s soft and delicate, with a strange dream-like intimacy, appearing to tell the story of the narrator’s love of a girl from the sea:
“She is the
daughter of the sea
coursing in me
haunting me”
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‘One’ has quavering, whispery vocals, sounding almost like Chad van Gaalen playing a slowed down folk song, with an atmosphere of isolation, although this time more emotional than geological, while ‘Martians’ teams subtle rumbling drums with strange lyrics (“Remember the martians will wreck your face”) with staccato chorus (“Before. I. Will. Fall. Down. In. Your. Little. Town.”). ‘Take Me to the Others’ opens with sparse guitar and birdsong, before blooming into a fragile but defiant tale of the ending of something and remaining your true self through what that can bring. Villalobo’s vocals begin as a restrained croon, but gathers volume and intensity towards end as he sings,
“Take me to the others
and let me fade away
you’re just like the others
with your silly little ways”
‘Love’ is all pianos and eventually lazy percussion and sad, lovelorn lyrics, a song about a love that is doomed from the beginning, not through cruel circumstance but because it was never wholly real in the first place. Next up is ‘Rain’, a short incantation intended to summon dark clouds, backed with plaintive acoustics guitars and minimal percussion. Closer ‘Just Shy of Survival’ is lead by gloomy piano which spikes in urgency through the track’s middle section, accompanied by Villalobo’s vocals, which sound more desperate than at any other point on the album. The song, and indeed the record, then ends in the sound of rainfall, which is hopefully a literal ode to the album’s geography rather than a sonic metaphor for Villalobos’s feelings. Or perhaps ‘Rain’ really is a spell after all?
There is currently a crowdfunding project underway to fund the limited-edition pressing of Daughter of the Sea to vinyl, which will go on sale to those France and Belgium, as well as limited run of CDs which will go on sale worldwide. Visit Microcultures to order yours. Villalobos is also being joined by French drummer Dimitri Dedonder for a European tour in September. Check out the dates on the House of Wolves website.