As it happens, there are many pop-savvier moves than opening your first solo-project album in seven years with a nine-minute meditation on a single, hypnotic organ chord while heartbrokenly repeating “I miss you” no fewer than 33 times. But there are probably none that are more Hope Sandoval. By now, whether fronting Mazzy Star, her Warm Inventions project or guesting on a particularly downcast Massive Attack or Psychic Ills track, you know what you’re getting from the Los Angeles chanteuse: an overflowing cup of hushed, sultry melancholy, which perfectly describes Until The Hunter, her third release with My Bloody Valentine’s Colm Ó Cíosóig as the Warm Inventions.
But it’s not all songs in the key of sad; “Let Me Get There” is a beautiful little bit of loping ’70s radio pop created in collaboration with Kurt Vile, “Treasure” invents a new codeine-country subgenre, and “Liquid Lady” weaves its black-magic woman-y vibe in a manner not entirely dissimilar from Janis’ finest moments with Big Brother (if sung at a totally different octave). It’s not all successful—I could do without Ren Faire sung/spoken-word tropes like “A Wonderful Seed” again—but as mood music for a particularly rainy series of months, it’s a perfectly bummed-out comedown.
—Corey duBrowa