Owen Pallett
In Conflict (Domino / Conflict)
13/20
While the puritan in all of us would like to have the capacity to at least purport to a sense of objectivity about the merits of cultural artefacts, the actuality is thus: nothing exists in a vacuum, nothing is without predecessors, nothing is what it is without the complex mass of preconceptions and schematic ideals that inexorably alter our relationship to anything. So however nice it might be to be able to review a record without thinking of other records, it can’t be done.
Owen Pallett’s 2010 masterpiece Heartland was so good that the listener succumbed to its concept – the trails and travails of a hyperviolent farmer named Lewis and the oppression he faced in the guise of the benevelonetly omniscient narrator Owen. We also fell in love with its immaculately arranged suite of orchestrally underpinned songs stuffed with meltingly gorgeous motifs and the kind of melodies most songwrit- ers would kill for. In Conflict isn’t quite there: Pallett still sings like a choirboy, still crafts songs that nearly burst with swooping strings and balletic brass, still displays a penchant for lyrics that teeter on the edge of embrassing but remain firmly stuck in the memory banks. It’s an undeniably strong album. It just isn’t Heartland. If you’re a stronger listener than this reviewer then you’ll find a lot to love. For the weak willed of us, you’ll be left with the subtlest aftertaste of slight disappointment.
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Words: Josh Baines
CONNECT TO CRACK
