Soft Hills, The / Noruz
Album: Noruz   Collection:General
Artist:Soft Hills, The   Added:May 2010
Label:Self-Release  

A-File Activity
Add Date: 2010-06-20 Pull Date: 2010-08-22
Week Ending: Aug 22 Jun 27
Airplays: 1 1

Recent Airplay
1. Aug 20, 2010: The Orphanage
Moon On Water
2. Jun 22, 2010: The Orphanage
Moon On Water

Album Review
Adam Pearson
Reviewed 2010-06-16
Indie Rock. Not really my thing. Shouldn’t have reviewed this. Very much like My Morning Jacket or Band of Horses or something. Slick, well-produced, kind of dreamy rock with some Americana influence. Pleasant but nothing out of the ordinary. No FCCs.

1. Sounds a bit like My Morning Jacket; rustic acoustic strumming with sustained organ and some melodic, almost surfy guitar, bridge is ethereal and airy. (4:24)
2. Melodic choral vocals, lush instrumentation with warm strings, double-tracked vocals, pronounced bass and drums, some epic guitars. (5:52)
3. Dramatic violins, lush, lush, warm production with lots of melodious guitars, adding to the ascending lead string refrain, mellow one. (4:55)
*4. Shimmery, ambient intro, melodic instrumental. Pretty. (2:03)
5. Sentimental vocals more up front here without the Jim James treatment, slow start, more twangy violin, light piano, actually builds nicely. (3:23)
*6. Grainy sample of adult talking to child with slow pathos-laden acoustic and electric guitars, builds to a more aggressive swirl, returns to mellowness with sample. No vocals. (4:20)
7. A little more upbeat, very high vocals, questionable lyrics, bobby rhythm, backing ‘doo doo’ vocals. Ugh. (5:09)
8. Distant relaxed strumming with slow pace, dancey drums come in, cycles through, dreamy textures, kind of interesting in parts with a lightly more daring vocal performance. (5:56)
9. A little bit earthy with relaxed acoustic-bent, some xylophone, relaxed backing vocals. I think fans of Fleet Foxes would like this. (3:40)
*10. More spaced out textures. Reminds me of a little band named Ester Drang. Check them out. Also this track is pretty good at blending space pop and dream rock. (4:03)
11. Another slow tempo with guitar-centric production, gets spaced out and very dreamy, builds kind of predictably, though. (6:34)
12. Brief instrumental. (0:29)
*13. Dramatic, slow, pretty piano, achingly good actually. (2:09)

Track Listing
1. Molten Change   7. Two Stars
2. Noruz   8. Silver Wings
3. Unborn Mind   9. The Great Undiscovered
4. Moon On Water   10. Yali
5. Radiant Dream   11. New Alchemy
6. Ghosts   12. Sunrise
  13. Dawn At The Devil's Golfcourse