Dirty Three hits high tide with 'Ocean'

Blending the beautiful voice of a violin, the wispy, pulsing scrapes of a drum and the droning twang of a guitar, the Dirty Three has a sound unlike any other band around right now, and the band members never sing a lyric. Their new album, "Ocean Songs," is full of brilliant cinematography, reeling in images with each new song.

With the same torrent of murkiness seen in '40s film noir, the Dirty Three presents a dark, smoky lament in a world of shadowy sadness and woeful loneliness. Its waves of sound exhilarate the dark recesses of one's mind and transcend upon madness. Pilfering through the dense dirtiness, a luminous epiphany of hope creeps through the mass of darkness, showing that all is bright and clear for a fleeting moment.

REVIEW
	Dirty Three Ocean Songs Touch and Go 3 stars Reviewed by Daily Arts Writer Chris Cousino

This great epiphany is achieved numerous times on "Songs," proved over and over again through each of the album's 10 songs. After a while, this point wears a little bit. The music is beautiful but, at times, feels somewhat similarly stagnant.

The first track, "Sirena," opens with a milky jazz tapping of a drum and the sad painting of a violin. While the song has a quiet eeriness, the melody has smooth transgressions and emanating tones. But tracks such as "Distant Shore" and "Last Horse On the Sand" convey this same feeling and sound, making the songs hard to distinguish from each other.

The two tracks to escape from this pending similarity are "Authentic Celestial Music" and "Deep Waters." "Music" explodes into a swirling tempest of crashing drums, driving guitar and the diamond-in-the-rough voice of violin. "Waters" is a 16-minute journey that blends intense, magical chord progressions fusing to a small withering death before reaching its ecstasy. This beautiful sadness is the essence of the Dirty Three and "Songs."

"Songs" is the perfect sound when the hypnotic allure of night has set in. It transcends that feeling of just chilling in a room gazing out a window into the blackness. As it induces many emotions of lonely sorrow and lucid hope, "Songs" resonates the enchanting seduction of the mysterious unknown.

04-01-98