The Soul of Spain

Remember slowcore? In the mid-'90s indie rock realm it was all the rage for a little while, and though some found its fly-in-a-molasses-jar pace and whisper-to-a-whisper dynamics maddening, it nevertheless offered up some of the best indie bands of the decade, like Low, Red House Painters, Idaho, and American Music Club (feel free to switch the stylistic designation out for the roughly equivalent sadcore tag at any point). Spain, fronted by singer/bassist Josh Haden, were at the forefront of that movement, and their 1995 debut Blue Moods of Spain remains a touchstone of the genre. After the 2001 album I Believe, the band hung it up, but about six years later, Haden gathered a new group of co-conspirators under the Spain banner and started playing live again, even performing the first album in its entirety to ecstatic fans. More than a decade after its predecessor, the fourth Spain album finally arrived in 2012, and while it's certainly a close cousin of the group's previous phase, The Soul of Spain is anything but a rehash.

The main link to the early Spain sound is Haden's vocals, which retain the same hushed, fragile, oddly pure tone they've had from the beginning. But while there's nothing on the album that anyone in their right mind would call a rocker, this incarnation of the band bears an undeniably brighter sound. Many of the tempos are still on the agreeably pokey side, but they occasionally pop into a perkier pace than longtime fans might have expected, and there's a bit more forcefulness in things like the way the drummer leans into the downbeat on "Sevenfold," and the scrappy guitar riffs that run through the midtempo "Miracle Man." It may not be exactly the Spain of old from stem to stern, but who wants to get frozen in time anyway? - AllMusic