José Gonzàlez - Local Valley Review
While it’s got potential to provoke your feeling so you’d shed a tear or even smile on the inconveniences, it’s neither soul-exposing nor providing social commentary strong enough to break through the current stream of politically-oriented artistic endeavours.
If you’re into the indie-folk scene, at some point Swedish musician José González’s heartfelt harmonies must've slipped into your mellow mornings’ playlists. Despite having a vast repertoire of original songs, he made his name covering international classics like Joy Division’s ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ or Massive Attack’s ‘Teardrop’. When it comes to albums, José likes to take his time to master every one of his records. After airing in 2007 his sophomore LP, In Our Nature, he took an eight years hiatus to work on Vestiges & Claws. Today, followed by six years of recording sessions, relentless touring (in the pre-pandemic era) and enjoying blessings of fatherhood, González is back with another full-length project, Local Valley.
The record opens up with, released back in February, ‘El Invento’, his first take on writing in Spanish. It’s a message of love for his little daughter and an intimate invitation into his gently hand-stitched world. Even if you’re not familiar with Spanish, within only two and a half minutes of the song, its slowly-paced acoustic guitar and smooth vocals tuck you in blanket-like melodies and protect from evil outside influences. It’s followed by ‘Visions’, where he opens up his sheltered world and sonically paints an image of a universe where good and bad are actually two sides of the same coin. It doesn’t matter which one is visible in the moment, as long as you’ll accept the inevitability of fate and come together with others as one. “Cycles of growth and decay/Cascading chains of events/With no one to praise or blame,” he sings out and sums up in the final line: “We are here together”.
‘The Void’ and ‘Horizons’ as both beautiful in a sense of their airiness with José’s voice on the forefront but this beauty feels bland. As soon as over, no striking memory of them stays for longer. You have to wait for a bit of a shake-up in ‘Head On’ that picks up the themes of the ambivalence of human experience but instead of praising stoic-like attitude, it invites listeners to break out of their ideological shells (“Forget your miracles/Forget your god/Join forces and deal with it”) and face modern demons imbodied by corrupted oligarchs, power snatchers and pervert incentives.
Lilla G is a short and sweet one, consisting of constantly repeating chant-like verses filled with that late-summer melancholy of bonfire nights mixed up with a tad of excitement of being away from home. It’s a perfect prelude for 'Swing', inspired by high-life from West Africa and Caribbean music and an invitation to dance. José wants you to sway your body following natural impulses wherever and whoever you are. We’re so up for that, especially that ‘Tjomme’ enhances the vibe and digs deeper with warm, rhythmic drums. The flames grow higher to slowly fade within the last three tracks.
In ‘Local Valley’ González doesn’t shy away from the most significant problems of the 21st century and turns his sight straight into their eye-burning truths. ‘Local Valley’ attempts to make an almost transcendent and ethereal body of work out of the chaos around us. While it’s got potential to provoke your feeling so you’d shed a tear or even smile on the inconveniences, it’s neither soul-exposing nor providing social commentary strong enough to break through the current stream of politically-oriented artistic endeavours. ‘Local Valley’ ended up a perfect mirror of its title. It feels familiar and strangely sweet even if talking about unpleasantries but it’s located right in the comfort zone of your metaphysical surroundings. This musical trip is a calm one. 'Local Valley’ takes on questions of humanity’s place in the universe, importance of living in peace with nature and each other but doesn’t contribute much to the dialogue. González doesn’t venture far enough to provide us with truly profound knowledge or even instrumental-oriented experiments. Nothing wrong with being consistently good or sticking to your brand but after a year and a half of being stuck in the comfort of four walls, we desire to explore beyond it. Beyond 'Local Valley'.