therealdavidsm
The type of album where you can't imagine listening to anything else while it's spinning. Legit. Grab a copy!
Favorite track: I've Studied You.
jasperpleach
We're only over halfway through, but this is probably going to be the album of the year. Frank brings real artistry and vision to his music with a dark romanticism and sexuality, and there's really nothing quite like it.
Favorite track: Housing Alcove.
No Longer is a suite of six absorbing, patient reveries on conflicted concupiscence and encroaching darkness by Berkeley songwriter Frank Ene, who composed the material in a period of solitude following the demise of his noise-pop group Pure Bliss. Ene abstained from socializing to write the songs, venturing outside mostly to work in the basement of a frame-shop or observe students on the nearby UC Berkeley campus, vintage self-help paperbacks stuffed in his pockets. When it came time to record, he opted to play nearly every instrument himself. “Some songs are affirmations,” he said. “The saddest ones I can’t remember writing, as if someone entered my mind and body in a really brutal way.”
Suffused with an atmosphere of slow-simmering tension, No Longer traffics in understated grooves reminiscent of latter-era Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds, with Ene’s rich voice somehow sounding at once wispy and full-bodied. “Flesh in the Womb,” one of the songs to feature songwriter and Fresh & Onlys guitarist Wymond Miles, channels the lasciviousness of Serge Gainsbourg as well as the beguiling sparseness of Dean Blunt. The lyrics to “Housing Alcove,” a crushing meditation on childhood trauma, reveal competing, interconnected feelings of vulnerability and ambition (a duality captured by the evocative album art). A dynamic, repeat listen, No Longer stands among the most musically arresting and emotionally contoured Bay Area solo debuts in recent memory.
- Sam Lefebvre
credits
released July 10, 2020
All songs written by Frank Ene
Produced by: Jacob Winik & Frank Ene
Additional Production: Wymond Miles
Engineered & Mixed by Jacob Winik
Additional Mixing: Johnny Goss
Mastered by Bijan Sharifi
Recorded at Tiny Telephone
Frank Ene: Vocals, Guitar, Acoustic Guitar, Baritone Guitar, Drum Machine, Percussion, Piano
Wymond Miles: Guitar
Adrianne deLanda: Vocals
Ivar Diehl: Saxophone
Album Photography by James Cromwell Holden
Design by Andrew Connors
Opener absolutely rips. Falls into the ranks of tracks like “Dance” by ESG, “Eisbaer” by Grauzone, “Damaged Goods” by Gang of Four or like the album description says Kleenex. This is some really good stuff. Favorite song is the opener but dedicate “Blue” to my friend Blue who lost her life at 22, she would have loved this album. TheBloodofChrist
Joy Division vibes with a strong Irish personality. Can't stop listening to A Hero's Death, I Don't Belong and Love is the Main Thing. One of the best album of 2020. danss_85