Last copies of the Limited Color Edition. (Note this merch offer includes the music on vinyl only.)
Released 11/11/22 on Husky Pants Records/Quarterstick Records
Fred Thomas writes:
Following the breakup of her sometimes tenuous, sometimes loud-and-thrashy band Rodan, guitarist/vocalist Tara Jane O'Neil regrouped with the Sonora Pine. Filled out by Rodan drummer Kevin Coultas, violin player Samara Lubelski, and June of 44's Sean Meadows, the first set of Sonora Pine material felt like a natural, if slightly softer, continuation of Rodan's dynamic and punk-descendant sound. When Meadows left the band shortly after working on their self-titled 1996 debut, however, the Sonora Pine turned a corner on their 1997 sophomore effort, II. The remaining members soldiered on as a trio, placing O'Neil's textural vocals and impressionistic songwriting style at the forefront of the album and conjuring seven songs of subdued, wavering melancholia. Home-recorded by Coultas on an eight-track recorder, there's a muted quality to even II's most emphatic moments. Tunes like "Cloister" or the stormy "Long Ago Boy" are as driving as the album gets, with dissonant guitar and violin figures pushed forward by roomy drum sounds, everything overlapping in a thick tension that only occasionally dissipates. "Cloister," in particular, serves as a calling card for what the Sonora Pine accomplish on II, with misty guitars and violin bedded by guest organ, flickering between passages of uneasy tension and fleeting resolution. Even more restrained songs like "Weak Kneed" and "Snows Cut Snapshot" tie together a dour lucid dreaming similar to what fellow Louisvillians Slint found on Spiderland combined with the yearning restlessness of the Dirty Three. Instrumental closer "Linda Jo" places bright, Fahey-informed acoustic guitars over a flutter of strings and lap steel swells, gently settling the stir of turbulent, conflicting emotions that preceded it. The song is a joyful finale to an album spent exploring liminal territory. With the exception of this hopeful closing track, II is cloudy, ambiguous, and stuck in the unnamed in-between spaces, like the transition between fall and winter or times when it's unclear if a relationship, friendship, or opportunity has ended or not. It's one of the first and most vivid examples of O'Neil capturing this very specific mood, and though Sonora Pine disbanded not long after II, she would continue refining different embodiments of this sound for decades to come with her always gorgeous solo albums. II was an early breakthrough in this mysterious magic, creating a glimmering world of soft-focus expressions that hung like smoke in the air and disappeared just as quickly.
The Cool Cloud of Okayness – Cloud vinyl LP
$22 USD
The Cool Cloud of Okayness – Classic Black vinyl LP
$20 USD
Where Shine New Lights – LP
$20 USD
Songs for Peacock – Black vinyl LP + 5 postcard set
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Songs for Peacock – Black vinyl LP
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Songs for Peacock – Stained Glass Blue transparent vinyl LP + 5 postcard set
$20 USD
Where Shine New Lights – CD
$14 USD
For All We Know –
JB236 - For All We Know - Yellow Vinyl 7"
Marisa Anderson & Tara Jane O'Neil
$10 USD
Dancer Gams
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Bird In Circle
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harp
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fingerbanger silkscreen print 2008
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Cheers to the Deer that I Ate
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FELT TIME THE HISTORY OF NOW by Jmy James Kidd
$22 USD
s/t – s/t vinyl
$17 USD
Tara Jane O'Neil and Kazumi Nikaido – Compact Disc
¥2,000 JPY
Peregrine (20th Anniversary Edition) – Peregrine (20th Anniversary Edition)
¥2,500 JPY
A Ways Away (2019 deluxe artist reissue) – A Ways Away limited edition cassette
$10 USD
Dispatches from the Drift – Clear cassette tape
$10 USD
To Trace A Raveling unique painted cover limited LP (Mississippi 2005)
Sold Out
Songs for Peacock – 5 Postcard Set
$10 USD
Tara Jane O'Neil California
TJO is a multi-instrumentalist,composer,producer and visual artist. She creates melodic and experimental music under her own name and in collaboration with other musicians, dancers and filmmakers. As a solo artist she has released 10 full-length albums.A founding member of Rodan and guest player for countless others, TJO has performed around the world at DIY spaces, festivals and the Pompidou. ... more
