Houses - All Night
- Written by Sam Jones_Parry
After Dexter Tortoriell was given the sack he escaped from Chicago, girlfriend in tow, to a cabin in Papaikou, a remote part of coastal Hawaii. Without the luxurious utilities of their home city – namely gas, electricity and running water – the pair spent two months living self sufficiently. They worked for their food and used rain water to drink, wash and cook. They even lit candles to preserve the solar power Tortoriell needed to keep his laptop running. In their moments of rest Tortoriell started recording All Night, the debut LP from Houses.
Where most buzz bands come out of heavily populated cities like LA and NYC, it’s refreshing to hear from an artist, of similar pedigree, who’s recorded away from the big smoke. The result is a listenable album with an earthy and introspective atmosphere, distinct from many of its contemporaries. Deep reds, toasted yellows and bruised ambers soak All Night’s mood and evoke the feeling of a solo, autumn hike.
There are two types of track on the album, defined by the prominence of Tortoriell’s voice. On some songs he takes a laidback approach, adding ambient ‘oohings’ and ‘ahhings’ almost as an afterthought. They lend atmosphere to the misty ‘Medicine’, complement the glass hand claps of ‘Lost In Blue’ and add a ghostly quality to the ethereal ‘Sun Fills’. These songs give the record an isolated feel, clinging to moments of fleeting human contact.
On other tracks Tortoriell steps forward from the haze and delivers audible lyrics that give the album both personality and its standout moments. "Find me when the summer has arrived/And I’ll spend my life with you/ Till the red sky’s turning blue/And that’s alright" he sings on the shimmering ‘Reds’. ‘Soak It Up’ tries to lure us into slumber, with its hypnotic plodding, while the warm vocals and glowing synth of ‘Sleeping’ manage exactly that.
It all makes for a rather nice trip with just the occasional stumble, evident on ‘Rose Book’. The song lacks the focus and clever layering found on most of the album, resulting in a kind of ambient electronic tumbleweed. It’s not awful but doesn’t quite hit the mark in a collection of otherwise very solid tracks.
All Night requires a few spins to lodge in the brain and lacks a distinct structure but, clocking in at under 35 minutes, it’s a digestible listen well worth the effort. It implores us to soak up the last of the autumn sun before crawling into a cozy cave to sleep for the winter – a damn nice idea, don’t you think?