Foster Neville - Through Lands of Ghosts

 Released: January 16

Through Lands of Ghosts is quite an emotive and surreal feeling album. On the one hand, it lives up to its title quite eloquently well as it sends the listener wandering through an assortment of haunting and ethereal soundscapes. But on the other hand, it also strikes an oddly happy tone through much of it as well, despite its ghostly settings. Even from the first track, we can hear this contention from the very first track as airy pads and atmospheres intertwine with a gentle plucked sound that echoes and reverberates along with echoey vocal. It feels like it is supposed to be somber, but celebrates that moment in such a way that it feels almost ambivalent. It sets the tone for the remainder of the album beautifully and sets things up for this back and forth that makes melancholy and mirth as friends. 

A piece that can be found later on the album, “Voices from an Abandoned Village,” takes this combination in a rather interesting direction. Taking recorded clips of people speaking of their lives and experiences, the track explores the past moments of those people from this long abandoned village and brings them to life in a surprisingly celebratory manner. It feels like it should be sad, but comes across as a wonderful homage to these long-since gone people, bringing a new life to their lives otherwise lost to time. The track previous to this one, “The Nine Tides,” sets up this exploration quite well with its lush strings and ethereal hums, though it touches on more wistful and less celebratory themes. 

But many of the other tracks serve as the ghostly reminders in between the moments of celebration. The passively floating and echoing pads of tracks like “The Calling” and “Dusklands” give us the full picture of the nature of life. The moments of happiness will always be bookended by the moments that remind of of our transient nature. The whole album is so incredibly life-affirming in this manner, reminding us that all will become ghosts one day and celebration of existence and no longer existence must be recognized and enjoyed in equal portions.