SPILL ALBUM REVIEW: WHITE DENIM – PERFORMANCE

White Denim
Performance
City Slang

Whenever I hear a new song, my brain tries to place the common sounds, tries to pull together references to say, “hey, keep listening, you’ll like this.” White Denim’s Performance is everyone’s brain pulling notes from every song they’ve heard and bobbed to in the last 50 years. This beautifully curated mashup of off tempo rhythms and complex chord progressions fills the listener’s appetite for abstract approach and kind of sends them through the wormhole of an every-era music experience. To place yourself in their recording studio, Radio Milk, it’s kind of incredible to think how many sounds came out of such a small space. Historically, it was once a horse stable and a general store. While the studio’s aesthetic may have changed, White Denim can still assure their patrons a full stock of everything they want and more. A criticism which at last became apparent is how short the album actually is. Coming in around 32 minutes with nine songs, the abrupt ending was a little disarming. The journey of this album should have lasted forever, a constant of random beauty turning its listener upside down and inside out. Alas, Performance came to a sweet, bittersweet end.

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