August Born is the pairing of Ben Chasny (
Six Organs of Admittance,
Comets on Fire) and one of his spiritual mentors, Japanese drummer Hiroyuki Usui (who played with
Keiji Haino's
Fushitsusha). The pair recorded in their respective countries. As such,
August Born is a semi-disjointed project: full of fits and starts and fragmentary thoughts; loose, jagged, and occasionally utterly angular. There are moments, however, when it all flows, as on "Dead Bird Blues" and "More Dead Bird Blues" -- which bookend "A Thousand Butterflies." Usui's moaning and droning vocal offers Chasny a place to dig under the frame of the "tunes" with his rather heavy hand and try to break the vocal down instrumentally. Also, Chasny's vocal on "Birds & Sun & Clay" is a tender aside -- reflective, poignant, and utterly empathetic with his guitar work -- and Usui's drumming skitters around the song rather than through it. The album closes with his solo "You Will Be Warm," a shimmering climax to a jagged and unsettling offering, leading the listener to wish that these two had been in the studio together instead of being literally a world apart. ~ Thom Jurek