
Channeling meaning and emotion through sound: picks by Music Curator Max Chavanne, founder and driving force at Sonic-Nurse.com, transcend music genres, breaking down musical boundaries. Top/ The album cover of Queen Of The Meadow (Jetset Records, 2000) by enigmatic art rock band Elysian Fields depicts Ophelia, a character from Shakespeare's play Hamlet, singing before she drowns. Elysian Fields is a Brooklyn, New York based band founded in 1995 by co-composers Jennifer Charles (vocals, instruments) and Oren Bloedow (guitar). Their music has been sometimes described as "noir rock", due to its sultry, dark and mysterious inflections, be it sonically or lyrically. The band uses mainly acoustic instruments, predominantly guitar, piano, bass and drums, with the occasional appearance of eastern instruments, classical strings, and subtle electronics, the focal point being the voice of Charles in the forefront. Their music is lush and melancholy, with poetic and surreal lyrics. Author of The Dark Stuff, Nick Kent says of their music, "Maybe we have their out-of-the-mainstreamness to thank for a sound that is still unique -- as sensual as a sleepwalker's wet dream." Bottom/ In The Aeroplane Over The Sea (Merge, 1998) is the second studio album by American indie rock band Neutral Milk Hotel. Pitchfork Media's M. Christian McDermott gave the album an 8.7 out of 10, referring to Neutral Milk Hotel as "one psych-rock band making music that's just as catchy as it is frightening" and said that the album "does a credible job of blending Sgt. Pepper with early 90's lo-fi." Jason Ankeny of Allmusic wrote, "lo-fi yet lush, impenetrable yet wholly accessible, In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is either the work of a genius or an utter crackpot, with the truth probably falling somewhere in between."
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