When attempting to encapsulate the essence of Providence duo Black Forest/Black Sea in one word, crossroads is the one that immediately comes to mind. Imagine a crossroad set somewhere in the wide-open flat lands of the west where each road secretly balances each other in terms of shifting landscape, mood and atmosphere. Forcefields and Constellations offers urban music for the middle of nowhere, somehow managing to be equally drawn to the pulse of the big city as to the vastest of landscapes. The opening "Orion" does include a guest appearance from Christina Carter on guitar but I'd like to think it's more than her series of sad and lonely guitar notes that makes this masterful track flow into dreamland with a kind of hazy grace that recalls Charalambides at their very best. Stay where you are and watch it glide effortlessly into the timelessness and fragile beauty of "Nylon 2," a track built around Jeffrey Alexander's impeccable guitar work. It's not like Alexander is the most technically capable guitarist on the planet but the way he makes this track breathe and the sort of images it presents are destined to stay with you for much longer than the track itself. "These Things" is the first track with vocals and I can't help but to think of Stina Nordenstam when Miriam Goldberg's thoughtful vocals are displayed against a tapestry of strings and electronic effects. If "These Things" discreetly signals some sort of straddle between the traditional song format and the formless then "Kyy Plays Perpetual Change" and ".with a Dead Man I've Never Met" point with steady hands in the direction of improv, samples, loops and experimentalism. From afar it seems like Goldberg and Alexander are just as willing to take things to the quietly extreme but they do so from different angles and backgrounds, and perhaps that's why this is an album that I find utterly hard to categorize. Their predilection for dreamy acoustic orchestrations bathed in an ocean of processed electronics connects to the American free folk scene but there is also something about the whole presentation of this recording that makes me think of classical music and avant-garde. And just as you think you have a rough idea of how to describe their sound the sad lament of "Tangent Universe" appears and I find myself brought back to that crossroad again. As I listen to the minimal cello tones of the closing "Jamestown" that seem to be all twisted around its own axis through modulation and effects it's apparent that we have reached the gate and found another path to the other side. Highly recommended. - Mats Gustafson, The Ptolemaic Terrascope
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