Woodsman: AEM108 Woodsman

Compressing this kind of physical sensationalism into something you can own and play at home is certainly no small task. Smartly, Woodsman’s recordings are different enough from their show tunes as to discourage direct comparison. For one, they’re softer. For two, they’re cleaner. Think of a pristinely rendered two-dimensional blueprint viewed with the understanding that some day it will become a house you can inhabit. They’re kind of like that, a concise symbolic language for communicating and making permanent  the ephemeral, a work of taxidermy designed to inspire admiration for the animal, alive and in its native habitat. Both “Beached” and “Balance” come off the five-song Mystery Tape EP that was released on Lefse records earlier this month.

What’s great about these tracks (both at the virtually radio-friendly durations of 4:41 and 4:37, respectively) is how they communicate the tension-wire tautness of the group’s gigs into a domestic night-terror, exchanging volume for eeriness and echo, distortion for space and clarity. From the submarine siren guitar on “Beached” to the skittery forrest-floor rhythms on “Balance”, the band allows unknowable evil presences to maneuver unchained through its etherized instrumental atmospheres. Post-rock has burdened itself with a number of distasteful connotations over the past two decades, but where other groups come off as embarrassingly bathetic (Explosions in the Sky) or comically overblown (Fucking Champs) or disingenuously mopey (Mogwai), Woodsman—like Neu! or Harmonia—comprehend the cumulative value of restraint, repetition, the acid-streak euphoria you get from listening to the same hypnotic ritual again and again.

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