With Where Leaves Block the Sun, Bevel follows through with the promise that was made with last year’s debut Turn the Furnace On. The new full-length is principal songwriter Via Nuon’s electric pastoral folk music, which begins with a symbolic Dante-esque like descent into the wilderness. Through the foliage disguised music, rich and fascinating images interplay with dark and light scenarios giving a chiaroscuro effect and also a sense of cinematic progression. Though difficult to describe in sound, one might compare Bevel to the other worldliness music of Pearls before Swine, Brian Eno’s experimental ambient period, or the climactic achievement of Popol Vuh’s lush film soundtracks. Co-produced, engineered and mixed with Michael Krassner (Boxhead Ensemble, Lofty Pillars and Simon Joyner), Where Leaves Block the Sun corrals some of Chicago’s best players, including Fred Lonberg-Holm (Peter Brotzmann Tentent, John Zorn and Light Box Orchestra), Ryan Hembrey (Edith Frost, Shannon Wright and Pinetop Seven), Jason Adasiewicz (Central Falls), Deanna Varagona (Lambchop), Jessica Billey (Bonnevill, Disaster Action Team), Mick Turner (The Dirty Three, Tren Brothers), and Scott Tuma (Souled American). With the help of his friends, and all the while stepping out from the shadows of his other bands Drunk and Manishevitz, Nuon has made another work of understated beauty and disquieting resonance.
