Customer Reviews

Tripping Back Into the Broken Days

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I must confess that "Tripping Back into the Broken Days" is my first album by Lycia. My only other exposure to the group was on a Projekt compilation I bought a couple of years ago. I absolutely was taken with the ethereal vocals and delicate melodies. I found the new Lycia album today when I went scrounging around for the new Black Tape For Blue Girl cd. At this very moment, I am listening to "Tripping Back into the Broken Days" and loving every second of it. Unlike BTFBG, the vocals are a little more distinct and not as muddled down by the music (not that there isn't anything wrong with that). The production is amazing. I feel like I am right there in that abandoned farm house on the album cover, listening to this album. I wish that a lot of albums had this same raw yet pristine sound that was achieved by Steve Roach. That sort of quality is rare in most albums that I buy. So far I am loving all the songs that I am hearing right now. At this moment the standout track for me is "Asleep in the River". I find Tara's vocals on this particular track extremely soothing and comforting to listen to. "Tripping Back into the Broken Days" is a stunning album, alongside BTFBG's "The Scavenger Bride". Just breathtaking to listen to.

...mmmkay, unlike thebestboy, I would have to aver that NOT everyone will enjoy this. However, if you like Lycia, you most certainly (or at least probably) will.

This is "really" an Estraya album, Estraya being the side project that Mike and Tara started after closing the door on Lycia. Estraya put out a self-released mini-album a couple of years ago, with stripped-down instrumentation: just acoustic guitar, keyboards, and vocals. No drums and none of the signature Lycia guitar sound. This is just like that, but longer. TBITBD was going to be an Estraya album (I emailed Tara several months ago and she told me another Estraya album had been completed), but I guess maybe someone decided the Lycia name was more marketable... whatever.

Anyway, as more of the same of Estraya, this stuff certainly works. Back around _The Burning Circle And Then Dust_ Mike started to discover the atmospheric potential of the acoustic guitar, and with this kind of material finds it even more. The sound really works well, and is even more contemplative and evocative than regular Lycia. You can really *hear* the stillness, and the hazy sunshine, and the memories pushing back into the present consciousness, time pushing you along like floating down a river. Man, but Lycia always inspires in me the purplest prose I can muster! It's a good thing. :-)

I'm always impressed at how well the Mike-Tara partnership works stylistically, with Tara's unique, spirited femaleness the perfect yin for Mike's brooding yang. Tara has some really nice songs here, particularly "It's Okay To Be Small" and "Asleep In The River". A lot of the songs do sound quite alike, however (I defy anyone to distinguish between "The Last Winter", "Fades Down Far", "Grey December Desert Day", and "Pale Blue Prevails"), but actually, that's something I've always kinda liked about Lycia: Mike's willingness to stick with a theme that works. There's a nice unassuming quality to it that way. Thanks for more music, you two...

This is music for memories, for ghosts, for nostalgic melancholy ... it's stripped down to the bare bones, and yet it's also lush & rich with feeling, haunted by benign & weary spirits. It captures the sense of lost times, of hazy golden days faded with the years, of the hushed silences & threadbare fabric of the receding past. It's resigned, reflective, floating on the passing breezes that disappear down abandoned roads. It's the finest soundtrack to sitting in an empty field, or by a solitary window, and watching the world go by like scraps of windblown paper, like sun-bleached photographs ...

For the contemplative soul, there's no better music ... wholeheartedly recommended.

I have been a fan for a couple of years now and was sad to hear Lycia decided to quit a few years back..
So I bought the Compilation Appearences CDs and kept the hunger in me at bay for a bit.. However at one point the sadness returned cause I thought the dream that is Lycia was foreven gone.

So then this came out. I was surprised yet extatic. Ordered it the same day.
Upon first hearing it though I was in shock at how different this sounds from previous albums.. However... One night I played it... It was dark, empty, humid and hot in the house... And I felt it.. I felt that ghostly atmosphere that in my eyes will allways be Lycia's greatest gift.
And I understood the album.. I felt like I was back in the desert in the US that I had visited a year earlier...
The vast intimidating yet somehow comforting emptiness I felt there was here.. on this album...
Truly a remarkable album.. This is Lycia at their best. If you like dreamy haunting music you can't go wrong..

My favorite track on the album has to be Vacant Winter Day. This is the song that made me look back and take a closer listen...
Absolutely haunting...
Mike as ever uses his whisper as effectively as always and Tara never sounded more like a siren, luring lost travelers further of their course..

Highly recommended.

Lycia's releasing more stuff now than when they were an "active" band. This is a good thing. For "Tripping," Mike and Tara have reduced the cavern-echo and left out percussion altogether. Every track is a gentle wash of angels-in-orbit synth and acoustic guitar. Tara (a gentle chanteuse) gets more voice time than usual, and Mike no longer sounds like a ghost. The album is an excellent bridge between "ethereal" and "shoegazer," two styles which aren't so far apart anyway.

It's hard to compare to a previous Lycia album, since the sound is stripped down so far from what they've done before. See the house on the cover? It's your childhood home, and you've come back to walk through it alone. Twilight comes, and you remember when you were five. There was no anger, but you sensed melancholy in every room. The old acoustic guitar is still in the corner of the room. You pick it up and begin to play. A sad, intimate, clear sound. Your mouth is closed, but there is singing in the room...

OK, enough melodrama. For Lycia fans: it's a continuation of the "Estraya" sessions, with none of the sonic chaos of "Vane" or Lycia's "Live" CD. For newbies: it's folk music on morphine. The other reviewer has it right - "Tripping" isn't really "goth," though it plays on the same emotions and sense of isolation. The packaging is clever. The CD tray shows a curving railroad track. The CD itself places a train on that same length of track.

I'm playing this thing to death. I hope a bunch of people discover Lycia through this album, and react strongly enough to bring the band out of retirement. I'm tired of my favorite bands retiring or breaking up.

This is the best Lycia CD yet and it is outstanding. This is not like Estella and some other Lycia CD's where the music is overlaid in layers which obscure the vocals. There is some excellent songwriting here. Tara's vocals highlights are "Alseep in the River" and the way too short "Blue Heron." Mike's vocals have never been better and in "Broken Days" and "Halfway Between" are particularly outstanding. My only small complaint is that while Mike's vocals are excellent, I would have liked to hear more of Tara's vocals. Incidentally forget the goth label that tends to hang on Lycia and anything on the Projekt label. This is a great CD with great music that will be enjoyed by anyone with an appreciation for good music.

... to describe how truly beautiful this album is. Serene yet sad, this is a perfect CD to reflect on the passing of the years.

First heard Lycia on live365 and had to have the cd and the next and then Tara by herself. My brother and I usually listen to this while we are out moon cruising. Warm summer nights with the top down and this is the perfect music for it. The first song Broken Days is so haunting and mesmerising. Every song is good on here and Tara Vanflower's voice is beautiful. Was searching to see if there was any info on them and found lycia on myspace, should check it out.

Another great release from Lycia--Definite influences from Sam Rosenthal, "Black Tape For A Blue Girl". You can't go wrong if you like Projekt Records. The music has matured and the guitar sound is much cleaner and acoustic. All the songs don't mesh together as before. Ambient and mellow as usual.

Bravo Lycia! Please, do not break up!