"Imagine you are sitting in an Internet cafi, in Cincinnati or something. All of a sudden, the doors kick open and in comes a band of roving Gypsies. They have the whole kit and kaboodle; the dancing bear, the knife jugglers and the lutes and stuff. They gather around one of the open PC's and plug their tinkered instruments into the machine. The music that follows, all through the evening, would sound like Black Forest / Black Sea. The pair, members of the Iditarod and keepers of the sacred flame that is Secret Eye Records, play such a variety of instruments that you almost feel like this is a chamber orchestra or something. The music does retain a great sparseness though, even with the long laundry list of instruments. It is this sparseness that lends this album much of its import. There is room for all the different sounds to grow and get under your skin, to create this pleasantly odd mixture of foreign and fuzzy music. It is not often that a record has cellos and lutes and mandolins as well as drum loops, theremins, and short-wave radios. Here, in this beautifully constructed folk world of the future, all of these disparate parts live in a perfect harmony. From the low growling distortion rising through "Blackbird on Gray Sky" to the cello and faraway radio buzz of "Banjo Song" to the haunting voice and pop cello (reminiscent of Eleanor Rigby) on "Beautiful Here", this album serves as the perfect soundtrack for the Gypsy campgrounds outside that Starbuck down the road. Just watch out for their curses and their loose morals the Gypsies, not Black Forest/Black Sea. I don't know what their curses or morals are like " - Grant Capes, Indie Workshop, Clive, IA
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