Nine Stones Close: Traces

Unlike most albums these days the cover art for the Nine Stones Close album Traces actually goes a long way to describing what you can expect to find once the disc is slipped into the player. Dark, foreboding, slightly drab, but deeply complex and involving aptly describes both the illustration on the cover, which is part garden, part ships rigging, part staircase and part windmill, and the music which it houses. Both also are richly rewarding, but only if you take the time to fully immerse yourself in the at first glance plain surroundings.

Intending to approach their album the same way in which classic vinyl prog releases used to be, Nine Stones Close have presented Traces as a fully fledged album that takes you on a journey through the five tracks on show, rewarding the listener through the musical and lyrical narrative which unfolds as you do so. Loss, growing up and getting older are the themes visited and while that may all sound a little pedestrian, the truth is that it is actually meant to be. The opening pairing of "Reality Check" and "Threads" make for fourteen minutes of introspective, melancholic music which slowly but surely begins to embed itself in your memory through its stark beauty and gentle pain. In fact it isn't until deep into the final song "Thicker Than Water" that NSC actually present us with what could actually be described as a riff, as up until that point the guitars wail in subdued loneliness, or strum acoustically. It all makes for an album that deserves, or more accurately demands your full attention to begin to unravel the moving and emotionally delivered music which has been crafted with deep integrity and thought.

Nine Stones Close have been compared to Pink Floyd, Marillion, early Porcupine Tree (maybe the closest link) and even Camel. However not even any of those bands offer up music that stubbornly and wilfully refuses to offer the uplifting release that almost never emerges on Traces and while that may make this all too earnest for some, the results become a hugely mature voyage that in truth is certainly not for all occasions. Somehow though this is an album that still contains a hugely melodic core and just enough hooks to let you in - but only if you are paying attention.

Track Listing
1. Reality Check
2. Threads
3. Falling To Pieces
4. Traces
5. Thicker Than Water

Added: October 7th 2011
Reviewer: Steven Reid
Score:
Related Link: Nine Stones Close Official Site
Hits: 3208
Language: english

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