Lia Ices’ Grown Unknown sounds like winter. Reverb makes her voice dreamy and distant. Her vocals melt into the other numerous instruments on the album. She contrasts cold synthesizer with lush string sections. There are solo piano interludes, acoustic guitar picking and drums played with brushes. She piles vocal tracks over each other like Bon Iver.
Appropriately, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon makes a guest appearance on the album’s best song, “Daphne.” It begins with fluttering strings and hypnotic acoustic guitar and crescendos with Ices and Vernon singing multi-tracked “oohs” and “ahs.” Vernon does his thing, dancing his crystalline voice around Ices.’ Just when it seems like the song has reached an apex with their dueling falsettos, the vocals drop out and a deep, bass piano chord crashes on the listener. This is the most pop-friendly part of the album, with stomping drums and noodling electric guitar that demand the listener’s attention.
By and large, Grown Unknown makes for good background music. Ices’ vocals don’t have melodies catchy enough to hold a listener’s attention but are pleasant enough for studying. Because her singing rarely stands out, Ices’ lyrics are often impressionistic or downright indiscernible. Still, they fit the musical landscape. She largely sings of the pastoral, like in “Daphne,” which retells a Greek myth of a woman turned into a tree using lyrics such as “Over the river runs/ The wind will carry me/ Call on nature now/ For she will keep you safe.”
Ices’ lyrical subjects underscore her songs’ capability to soundtrack life’s scenes. For instance, one could easily imagine hearing “Lilac” on Grey’s Anatomy as she almost whispers, “For only you/ I sing for only you/ I sing” over acoustic guitar and a faint electronic pulse.
Grown Unknown rarely gets loud, but when it does, Ices’ music has far more interesting dynamism than the songs that are uniformly quiet. “Bag of Wind” doesn’t pick up until guitar, piano and percussion kick in during the chorus. “Ice Wine” ends with a captivating instrumental string outro that surpasses the subdued parts that precluded it.
These songs are built out of fragments of melody and musical phrases. “Grown Unknown” shifts from nearly-militaristic clapping to repetitive acoustic guitar strumming to a soaring string section and then combines them all together. “Love Is Won” meanders through a piano introduction, slowly adding drums, a killer organ line, percussion shakers and ambient electric guitar.
Ices bills herself as an experimental pop musician, as evidenced by the complexity and atmospheric nature of her music. The title track best represents how Ices combines experimental sounds and techniques with a pop sense. The clapping carries the song until the strings bring it to a finish.
While her music may be experimental, Ices’ voice has many pop contemporaries. She has a voice similar to Ingrid Michaelson, but without the ear for catchy hooks. There are sounds of Cat Power’s Chan Marshall with less soul. Maybe the best – and easiest – comparison is that she’s Jewel minus the sweet yodel. While there’s no “Who Will Save Your Soul” on Grown Unknown, it still slowly envelops and rewards listeners through repeated plays.
3/5 Stars
