Vestals - Holy Origin (2020)

Reverberant dream-pop shoegaze from Vestals, the solo vehicle for LA’s Lisa McGee, who has appeared on records with Sarah Davachi and Jefre Cantu Ledesma and lends her calibre as the first release not by Evan Caminiti (Barn Owl) on his Dust Editions label.

“McGee is the sole producer and performer on her sophomore effort, Holy Origin. Since her last offering she has evolved her sound and process, placing a new emphasis on electronic processing, carving out negative space where slow burning rhythms and spectral melodies ebb and flow. Her songcraft is built on the foundations of atmosphere and experimentation that have defined her collaborative outings, but here she has meticulously built up her arrangements into a fully fleshed out vision of luminous dub informed avant-dream-pop.

Sinuous vocals and desolate guitars are rendered in crisp 3D, swallowed by viscera rattling bass and sizzling clouds of synthesizers. Hypnotic melodies and shimmering harmonies nestle within disorienting digital manipulations, conjuring a boundless, smoky twilight. Passages hover and undulate, sustained in trance states before crashing down into lush chorales that comfortably dwell in the space between euphoria and heartache.

Fusing memoir with contemplative inquiry, McGee traces the blurred boundaries between the self, the other and the world, capturing various states of desire-ambivalence and surrender. Each track is a meditation on the tension between opposing forces: the ideal and the real, the essential and the cultivated, the erotic and the ascetic. Through the exploration of these dialectics, Holy Origin unfolds as a darkly sublime reverie.”