Music

Track Of The Week: "Columbus" by Snowmine

by Chris Budd

Another nice surprise in my inbox today, a new band to get familiar with: Brooklyn’s Snowmine.

The quintet formed out of a longtime friendship between bassist Jay Goodman, drummer Alex Beckmann, and lead singer/composer Grayson Sanders, adding guitarists Austin Mendenhall and Calvin Pia later on. Their latest effort is the album Dialects, out February 4th via their own imprint Mystery Buildings.  

The album was entirely written and produced on their own and recorded by Jake Aron (Grizzly Bear) and Yale Yng Wong (Here We Go Magic) in a church in Uptown Manhattan. Chronicling a disoriented period in singer Grayson Sanders’ life (when after the band’s first record, he spontaneously left his job and spent the following year wandering with a single bag), the lyrics are pulled entirely from the journal he kept during his travels. “
Dialects” is about communication—with the self, with others, with society. It’s about its breakdown, its triumphs, and its misgivings.

Growing off of the band’s previous release, this new record marks a subtle shift in the their sound from optimistic to a more ambient, meditative nostalgia. It features real reverbs and vintage synthesizers with the beautiful 1960’s cinema-inspired string, woodwind, and choir, orchestrations.

For fans of bands like Midlake or Grizzly Bear, check what the band says is “making big sounds seem intimate,” via their song “Columbus”. 

Look for this band on the road with Small Black through March and April.