The Sea

I am listening to one of my favorite records, Dutch harbor: where the sea breaks its back by Boxhead ensemble. It's a record of mostly instrumental music, very quiet and atmospheric (I would usually be suspicious of that tag, discrediting it as "ambient music", which I usually detest). I haven't seen the documentary to which Dutch Harbor is a soundtrack. I know, however, that it is about a fishing port located on Unalaska, an island off the coast of western Alaska in the Bering sea. Belonging to the loose and by now quite notoriously boring tradition of "post-rock music" (the band consists of members from famous bands) Boxhead ensemble makes slow, droning tunes based mostly on guitars, but also on piano. Dutch harbor also contains radio sounds, spoken parts and also a song with Will Oldham on leading vocals. Without being especially melodical, the record is really captivating as it creates a quite specific sound, restrained and subtle.

The music of Rachel's can be seen as a point of comparison, but their music has, in my opinion, a much more "academic" feel to it which is quite hard to explain. The music sometimes comes out as too clinical, too pure. Another reference is Ocean songs, a haunting, maritime themed album by Australians Dirty three. But Dirty three's music is charcterized by melodies, however dynamic, rather than drones.

I stumbled on the album when killing time in a record shop in Prague a thousand years ago. I haden't heard anything about it then. Shut off from the world by a pair of headphones I was immediately enthralled.

Listening to this record makes me realize how much I sometimes miss living on an island surrounded by water. Dozing off on a car ferry in winter time, feeling numb, listening to the roar of crushing ice and engines. Freezing one's ass off in a car, looking at the water and the mist on the car windows.