Polara

Polara's Debut

     

Polara is one of my favorite "unknown" bands. Ed Ackerson's voice is subtle and subdued, but his breathy vocals set an interesting mood along with the nearly-ever-present, almost ambient noise background noise. The songs here range from all out guitar bash to softer, relaxing folkie stuff. It all fits nicely together to make an enjoyable album.
Counting Down is a great rock song that stretches the limits of what a guitar should sound like and Source of Light keeps on in the same vein. Taupe and Anniversary 6 are both near-acoustic ballads that are downright beautiful in excecution and delivery, with spacey backgrounds and vocal treatment. Headphones make the experience even more surreal. Listening Now and Letter Bomb are pretty similar midtempo tracks, but are very good as well.
There are a couple of throwaways here...Squelch is so over the top covered in, well, squelch, you can hardly discern the vocals and instruments and State, with it's quiet beginning and explosive middle, while not a bad song doesn't really do much for me. And bless iTunes for not even including the obnoxious untitled track 13, which would damn near spoil the album if you couldn't hit the stop button.
All in all, a really good listening experience. And that's true of most of Polara's catalog. Unfortunately iTunes is missing the next two albums from Polara. C'est La Vie and Formless / Functional (personal favorite) are both recommended and can be had for cheap on most popular shopping sites on the web.