February 29, 2008

White Hinterland

Phylactery Factory

8 / 10 Despite having a name that brings to mind a rowdy psychedelic collective that shares a mushroom dealer with Dead Meadow and a timeshare cottage in Laurel Canyon with Black Mountain, White Hinterland is in fact just one person. Namely, wispy 22-year-old folkstress Casey Dienel. Dienel works a mean line in little-girl-lost trilling and her fragile vocals are at their eeriest during ‘Phylactery Factory’’s opener, the jauntily named ‘The Destruction Of The Art Deco House’, which is a chilling, piano-led ballad that shuffles about like graveside jazz. Things look up considerably with ‘Dreaming Of The Plum Trees’, a pared-down bossa nova boogie, and while the verdant ‘Hung On A Thin Thread’ and the ukulele-lashings of ‘Vessels’ may slow proceedings down, Dienel’s baby blues is nothing less than beautiful.

Leonie Cooper

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