The main problem which keeps me from reviewing post-rock as often as I used to do is that every post prompts self-introspection into why I don't review, and listen to, post-rock as often as I used to do. I'm kind of tired of it at this point. The facts are that, somewhere along the way, something in me changed rather than the genre (whose immutability is one of it greatest strengths and weaknesses). At the end of the day, the results are what matter; the change left me open only to very specific post-rock albums. It's less about style and more about something that's also true for heavy metal for me: a certain unquantifiable earnestness and emotional approach. Said less favorably, a lot of post-rock these days leaves me unmarked, a bit lost and askance at the grand emotions on display. There are long periods of time where no post-rock album really touches me and I start to wonder if I've just lost the ear for it.
And then I put on something by Caspian. Whether it's the old classics or their new, self-titled album, there is something about the way that Caspian approach composition that unlocks the door of my heart and moves me. As I said above, it's hard to put a finger on what that is. With Caspian, their self-titled release which I hope is not their final (self-titled albums tend to make me feel like they are a goodbye), there is something earned to the hints of hope and resilience that are on it. Saying that the album is "brighter" is perhaps not the right approach. It's not a bright album. But more than any of their previous releases, there feels to be a wellspring of power at the core of Caspian. In this regard, though musically there is not too much in common, the album made me think of And So I Watch You From Afar the most.
"Far Country", the second track, is probably the best example. The immediate suspect for this "robustness" is the string line on the track but I actually think the power comes from the bass. There is something so buoyant to where the bass is located in the mix and to what it does in the composition. Listen along the three minute mark, arguably the centerpiece of the track, to what the bass does and how it interacts with the aching, articulated guitar line. It's more than just groove, it's this powerful sense of being lifted up and carried somewhere new, a feeling that works incredibly well with the track's overall theme of discovery and wonderment. On "A Great Fire", the album's fourth track, the bass is used in a completely different capacity, to create one of Caspian's heaviest tracks to date. Grumbling with a stoner metal quality, the bass sets up the long build up at the track's beginning and the inevitable crash that arrives later on. But here too there is something arresting about the bass, unique in its sound and its use in the history of the band and the genre.
I chose the bass to focus on because I have a predisposition to the instrument on post-rock and because it's the part of this album I enjoyed the most. But there is so much more on this release, ideas around the classic arrangement of guitars in post-rock, how melancholy, homesickness, joy, and dogged desire are expressed, what to do with cymbals, and much more. It has reminded me that, no matter how much I change, there is still something that I fundamentally love about post-rock. It simply takes masters to unlock that place within me these days and Caspian are perhaps one of the leading candidates for the title of the masters of post-rock. Long may they reign.