SoCal musician Brian Collins started recording under the moniker
Hurt Valley following an encounter on a road trip to Death Valley in the early 2010s. The living-room project gained momentum after he settled in Los Angeles in 2014, though it remained a part-time endeavor, capturing the thoughts and emotions of moments over a period of several years. The resulting debut album,
Glacial Pace, is populated by dreamy, melancholy reflections and a gentle twang, a combination that drew the interest of esteemed indie label Woodsist (
Woods,
Anna St. Louis,
Bonny Doon). Its headspace and leisurely pace are established on opening track "Geology Dreamer" with relaxed drums, fat strummed guitar, and harmonic detailing on an electric. A little over a minute in, Collins' calm, craggy vocals note "Stuck at a glacial pace/Frozen in a memory" just before the song shifts through a wistful chord progression while presenting a way forward. Later, the easygoing, head-bobbing "Live in to It" mixes bittersweet melodicism with moments of dissonant distortion and anxious recollection. The livelier "Be the Lighthouse" has more active drums and syncopated rhythms alongside further references to being stuck. Over the course of the album,
Hurt Valley evokes names like
Neil Young and
George Harrison as well as the softly psychedelic haze of
the Byrds while sounding lost in time much more than of another era. The idea of being lost is underscored by song titles like "No Meaning" and "Immaterial Worlds." Lyrics aside, it's Collins' knack for warm, low-key melodies and immersive bittersweetness that will return listeners to
Glacial Pace, at least when in a ruminative frame of mind. ~ Marcy Donelson