Throughout their career, Manchester Orchestra have composed five sonically driven albums, each album fully cementing a different aspect of their sound. At the beginning of the 2010’s the band went for a fuller sound incorporating unique instrumentation setting their music apart from their contemporaries. Yet still able to return to the core of rock with four-to-the-floor grooves that capture the true essence. Each record is a pivotal moment for the band as they transition to new stages in life, capturing that for their loyal base.
With The Million Masks Of God the band not only takes life into full focus. They are as fined tuned as it comes. Utilizing the best of rock and everything that has come before with the best of what indie rock has to offer. Pure to the taste, potency unmatched.
Kelly Lee Owens – Inner Song, Album Review
As their last album celebrated new life, written as an ode to Hull’s then-newborn daughter. Then ‘The Million Masks Of God’ copes with death. As the band recorded the album during the final days of guitarist Robert McDowell’s father.
“I was told that there’s a wonder in the place our bodies go,”
As you listen, you can feel this mournful haze as it rests over the entirety of the record. While the album does deal with death, it also goes into processing the unknown of the afterlife. Focusing on the bonds of community to help pull through tragedy and loss. Each song draws out powerful emotions. Touching in every sense with a richness only achieved through experience. Tried by fire.
Musically, this album holds a cinematic thoughtfulness. As each cut serves as a sonic journey though this emotional period for the band. Records such as ‘Keel Timing’ and ‘Bed Head’ slowly melt into into second form to reveal lush arrangements paired soothing acoustic guitars, representing the deep-seated emotions of the album’s grief.
Manchester Orchestra as it stands is a best kept secret. While over the years they’ve displayed so many different aspects to their art. ‘The Million Masks Of God’ is a culmination of all these experiences. As the band come to a full circle experience. Explore the treasure of Manchester Orchestra, the grandeur and acoustic bliss which just cementing their legacy as a legendary indie band to treasure.
