Review Summary: No longer the genre's ugly duckling, pg.lost finally shows what it's made of with its third record, "Key."
Swedish post-rock outfit, pg.lost, always seems to get put on the back burner in the world of instrumental music. Despite being consistently passable, it’s not difficult to see why the group always escapes the collective consciousness in favor of other more well-known bands. With its common usage of builds and crescendos, and often trite attempts at profundity, pg.lost can easily be thrown in with the “post-Explosions in the Sky” conglomerate. Well, that was until its latest outing,
Key, which sees the band lose some of the derivative baggage in exchange for a much more amiable sense of individuality.
Okay, well the band hasn’t quite shed off every inspiration. Yet instead of sucking off the teat of every twinkle laden post-rock band out there, pg.lost has instead decided to add a little more rock into its sound. One can hear Russian Circles, Form and Fate, and The Evpatoria Report rear their heads when things start to get a bit heavier. It’s a welcome change of pace from a band that had previously relied too heavily on the over dramatization of its music. “Terrain” is a prime example of the band’s revitalized sense of songwriting. Retaining the more beautiful aspects of its sound, pg.lost adds the aforementioned dense instrumentation with panache and skill. Like much of
Key, the song is very driven, with the percussion playing a large role in keeping a deliberate pace. But the true heavyweight comes in the form of the album’s closer, “Weaver.” “Weaver” is surprisingly very different from the rest of the record, as it lacks the overall focus of each of the other tunes. However, what it lacks in focus it makes up for with great atmosphere and stunning songwriting. Haunting keys and guitar paint a sense of urgency as the song goes through multiple transitions until its cathartic and breathtaking release. “Weaver” feels as if pg.lost has finally realized its desired sound, only after moving on to greener pastures.
Key isn’t the perfect record, nor is it an album to bring the genre’s detractors into the fold. Despite having some new ideas, they aren’t really all that original out of context, just new to the band. As a cohesive package, however, the album succeeds in offering up a wonderfully produced and lovingly written batch of songs.
Key is the album pg.lost needed to make, and it’s great to see a band so fully capable finally reach its potential.
