via//chicago

via//chicago@random: Grizzly Bear - "Marla"

This is one of the most beautiful, haunting songs on an album filled to the brim with beautiful, haunting songs. A ghostly waltz slides out of a darkened parlor, into the early morning. Lethargic, drunken voices sing and sway along as they clutch to the remaining decadence in a valiant attempt to stave off morning and sobriety. The track oscillates slowly and obtusely, with different instruments and voices coming to the forefront at various points - piano here, horns there, percussion everywhere. In fact, its the scatter shot percussion work that just barely holds this thing all together. It isn't the easiest song to grasp, but a perfect example of the mood Grizzly Bear is capable of conjuring.

The song becomes all the more haunting and beautiful when one learns that the song combines Grizzly Bear's atmospherics with a manipulated copy of an old 78 produced by founding member Edward Droste's late aunt, herself once an aspiring musician.

Grizzly Bear - "Marla" (taken from Yellow House)