Josaleigh Pollett – “Like a River” | Single Review
/
Audio Antihero
I was a wistful teenager in an era when being a wistful teenager all but required getting really into The Postal Service. During this time, I came to love the band’s story just as much as I did their sound, often fantasizing about the magic I might someday unlock working on music with a far-off collaborator. Then, I gave it a try. It was not magic. It was downloading a new version of Logic. It was receiving Sampler files with no sample. It was looking up how to roll back to an older version of Logic. It was, in short, excruciating.
If nothing else, the experience left me with a deeper appreciation for artists who are able to excel while collaborating over long distances, which is one reason I’ve been very keen to hear Josaleigh Pollett’s new album, If I Let It Quiet. The record finds the Salt Lake City-based Pollett working with collaborator Jordan Watko under unfamiliar conditions, the pair now separated by a sea following Watko’s relocation to Japan. Though I doubt adapting to this situation came without growing pains, there aren’t any to be found on their newest single, “Like a River.” Pollett and Watko are perfectly in sync, with spaced-out synth percussion and swirling samples wrapping themselves around acoustic guitar and raw vocals in a sublime combination.
Because Pollett’s voice creates such a strong, engaging focal point, there’s plenty of room for the rest of the production to shift and play around without the song becoming disjointed. There are moments where the mostly clean lead vocal almost glitches to become part of the electric peripherals, but you always get snapped back out of the cyclone. The start of the fourth verse is particularly great, where one of the track’s more expansive soundscapes falls away to give us a pulsing bass rumble as Pollett sings the album’s title lyric, “If I let it quiet / Who am I if not my thinking?” It’s a mesmerizing moment, like having all the stage lights pulled save for one spotlight set on a masterfully delivered soliloquy.
These sectional shifts are perfectly timed and bring with them a sense of drama and gravity. All of it is impressive in its own right, but knowing that Pollett and Watkins were able to get on a wavelength like this while half the world away from each other is really incredible and only increases my anticipation to hear the rest of the record, due out this time next month.
Josh Ejnes is a writer and musician living in Chicago. He has a blog about cassette tapes called Tape Study that you can find here, and he also makes music under the name Cutaway Car.
