Lynn Avery & Cole Pulice

Sounding like a long distance call across space and time, the latest collaboration from Lynn Avery & Cole Pulice finds the artists mapping the shape of longing. Expanding on the dynamic from their last outing, Avery lays down a base of synth and guitar, a sparse landscape that’s scratched by winds and often at odds with the sun. To this, Pulice adds their warm, woolen sax and bass clarinet, tapping deep into the listeners’ yearning for comfort among increasingly ominous odds. Underpinned with field recordings, the pieces feel siphoned from unseen forces, built on memory and magnetism, imbued with an ache that sits deep within the human condition.

The pair had to adjust their working model for the record, now separated by considerable distance between Minneapolis and Oakland, but the distance only lends a certain tapestry quality to the pieces, woven over time rather than working off of the immediate reflection of improvisation and reaction. While the record mostly finds the pair alone parsing the infinite between themselves, it does also allow for a few collaborations to enter their musical sphere. Fellow bay area composer Ambrose Akinmusire adds trumpet to “A Mote of Frozen Eternity,” helping to shape its meditative saunter, while Charlie Bruber adds bass with subtle flourish to several tracks. The album sits in suspension between melancholy and hope, a weighted blanket that holds the listener while gently breaking the heart.

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