Monday 18 February 2013

Albums for Life: 49: Duncan Sheik: Phantom Moon


I first heard Sheik through his hit "Barely Breathing" off his self-titled debut album. The earlier offerings were quite 'up' poppy fare. 
'Phantom Moon' is more melancholic. Here he slows things down; the songs feature lyrics written by New York playwright Steven Sater. 
There are pianos, strings and occasional, understated drums, the music Sheik puts around Sater's poetic stories is austere and quietly beautiful. There is occasionally a sense that Sater has tried a little bit too hard with poetry that doesn't always work as lyric, but I find myself listening to this often; the sound of the album is everything here.






2 comments:

  1. The debut is a lovely lp and was close to my list. For some reason I stopped at that , until his lastest a set of covers of 80s songs. I kow I've mentioned this one before but it is well worth checking out as they are all songs I liked as originals and he brings something different to all of them.

    His voice on this sounds slightly different , less polished. The lp cover is a thing of beauty as well.

    I've got quite a bit of catching up to do as there are 5 lps between the 2 I own!

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  2. I heard Sad Stephens Song somewhere before and really liked it. I thought it might be Smog/Bill Callahan at the time. Really like it and will have to listen to more.

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