Bedroom Community

You may well already be familiar with Nico Muhly’s work without realizing it. He has collaborated with Antony (of & the Johnsons fame, who provides vocals for the exquisite ‘Keep In Touch’ here) and has performed on Bjork’s Medulla LP as well as her soundtrack to Matthew Barney’s Drawing Restraint 9. The album is superbly produced by Valgeir Sigurdsson, who also worked on the two aforementioned Bjork albums, in addition to producing Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s recent work, The Letting Go. The combination of Muhly’s formidable modern classical chamber compositions and Sigurdsson’s greatly textured and varied production makes for some pretty remarkable listening. Very much in the vein of the recent output of Max Richter and Johann Johannsson, Speaks Volumes is at the most accessible end of the modern composition spectrum and is an absolute pleasure to have discovered. If you're after one of those records no one's heard off but that everyone will want to own once given an airing - this is the real deal. Gorgeous.

Boomkat