Peer Validated

Pictured: Phosphoresicles. Greek God of light through pink curtains.

Matthew Houck is a wise and rustic man. I imagine with no proof what-so-ever that he’s so often pictured without clothes on because he is protesting something very important that we aren‘t yet ready to come to face with. Possibly a statement about our society’s general conformity, or maybe he is simply celebrating the nature of humankind. I don’t know what it is exactly, but I do know that it’s something very deep inside of him, and someday we’ll see that it’s something very deep inside of us all. I also like to think that he wears his beard for the warmth that it gives to his face and underchin, or possibly as a soup catcher. Probably though, it’s a combination of soup catcher and because it makes him look really cool.

Pride, the new album from his project Phosphorescent, is another celebration inside us all. Its eight songs are both soothing and haunting, like a trip through the forest at night where we cling onto our flashlights for the little bit of guidance that they give in the directions we point them. With Houck’s songs, there is a path directly ahead, usually a soft guitar leading through delicate, personal hymns, while the rest of the sounds surround us with mystery. On Be Dark Night, his layered vocals are warm and fuzzy, inviting us, while a palette of percussion instruments echo and linger around us. Wolves is a chilling 6 minutes of Houck’s crackling voice carving itself into a progression played on ukulele, joined by a harmonium and bits of a distant, airy guitar. At parts, I think Phosphorescent is similar to the various works of Will Oldham, very open and spiritual, sometimes approaching Tony Dekker’s organic, Americana style with Great Lake Swimmers, while also reflecting a bit of Tom Waits’ craze. By the end of Pride, I think there’s a naked-in-the-dark feeling, but a reverence for whatever the emotion behind that is, like maybe we should have been here all along.

Phosphorescent - A Picture Of Out Torn Up Praise

The album’s opener, A Picture of Our Torn Up Praise.

Phosphorescent - At Death, A Procalmation

And this is At Death, A Proclamation. Here, Houck arranges around a tape that he recorded from his car of a marching band practicing. You can hear the hiss as the tape starts, the cadence beginning and the march. At the end we hear his finger pressing down on the stop button.