Espers, “The Road of Golden Dust,” Espers III (Drag City, 2009)
The third long-player from Philadelphia’s Espers tightens many of their ideas, and captures the band’s sound the best. Greg Weeks’s production is as fine as ever, crisper here than in the past, with superb definition giving the multitude of voices in the band room to spread out. (Week’s production of bandmate Meg Baird’s 2007 solo album, Dear Companion, was similarly crystalline.) Baird’s voice on Espers III is at once fragile and majestic, with “The Pearl” standing out as a particularly delicate use of her instrument. The fuzz guitar tones are excellent, at once vintage and modern, like so much of what they do. Many critics seem to spend most of their time fretting over the proper labels to apply to Espers, and finding the appropriate obscure antecedent to their sound. Let’s not be so perverse. Listen to what they can do.
