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Artist
Uzi & Ari
12+ albums
shoegazeelectronicindietronicaindiepost-rock
about
Rioting quieter than most, Uzi & Ari seems to essentially be the solo project of one Ben Shepard, of Salt Lake City - It Is Freezing Out is his second long-play collection following last year’s Dont Leave In Such A Hurry. These songs are well fleshed-out by an assortment of accomplished musicians, each lending their own nuances to proceedings, but at this album’s core beats the heart of a single man only. Tracks skirt around the edges of acts like Mogwai and The Postal Service – beats are supplemented by drones and twinkles direct from the outer reaches of the solar system – but the overall impression left by It Is Freezing Out is one previously associated with The Album Leaf. Its these echoes that characterise the album’s latter stages – beginning buoyantly, it drifts into dreamscape territories with wonderful grace and assured compositional confidence. Shepard’s never hurried: his songs are allowed to expand at a casual pace, with ne’er a too-spontaneous spark of inventiveness or awkward change of direction to be heard. Although a couple of efforts can be accurately categorised as background fodder, highlights are well worth repeat plays – ‘Influenza’ is a crackling and convulsing number that eventually shifts down a few gears and fades quite wonderfully to an understated conclusion, while ‘Drowsy, Drowsy’ and ‘Trainwreck’ come across like lost outtakes from Radiohead recording sessions conducted between albums three and four. At times, too, Shepard emotes affectingly wit
