It’s hard to believe that a band as seemingly simple as Low continues to evolve a quarter century into their career, but here we are. Their second album with Bon Iver producer B.J. Burton, Double Negative takes the band’s basic sound (slow, spare, but taut with drama) and fills the space between notes with ambient rumbling, often turning the music into a kind of palimpsest—a beautiful song hidden inside crumbling sound. If anything, what makes the album so unsettling isn’t its sense of silence, but of continuous noise, so subtle you might mistake it for a distant train or footfalls in the hall. Still, the anchor is the writing and interplay of Mimi Parker and Alan Sparhawk, whose best songs—Parker’s “Fly,” Sparhawk’s “Dancing and Blood”—explore the human condition with a frailty and sense of low-grade horror that has always set them apart.
Quorum:
Quorum's not the reason
With selfish interest
You've got to play it like a chord
This time it's all provoke
In torn and vacant stares
They try to blame it on the cold
I'm tired of seeing things
You put away the book
What are you waiting for?
(I am not above the law
I can only go so far)
It started out as nothing
And then the wait a while
So nice to meet you, man
I couldn't help but notice
Dancing and Blood:
What could I say?
Taken aback
All that you gave
Wasn't enough
What could I say?
Taken aback
All that you gave
Chasing the line
Tear in the cut
It's inside
Keep in the know
Throw in the earth
Dancing and blood
What could I say?
Taken aback
All that you gave
Wasn't enough
Fly:
I thought we had it made up
After all we had to pay up
Keep it knocking on the cellar
That's no way to earn a dollar
But I don't know
And I don't mind
Leave my weary bones
And fly
You're telling me just one more
I keep it like it's torture
Keep my body like a soldier
You gotta tell me when it's over
But I don't know
And I don't mind
Take my weary bones
And fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Fly
Tempest:
There suck I
Bell I lie
Owl do cry
And bat to fly
Forgive, forget
Live and let
You grin and paw
And laugh it off
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Forgive, forget
Live and let
You grin and paw
And laugh it off
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Even when you're on
Always Up:
Always up
Must be tough
Temptation
Frustration
Turn it out
Break it down
Mistaken
Unshaken
I believe, I believe, I believe, I believe
Can't you see, can't you see, can't you see, can't you see
I believe, I believe, I believe, I believe
Can't you see, can't you see, can't you see, can't you see
I see it
Hearts trailing
What you so
Afraid of
Always Trying To Work It Out:
I saw you at the grocery store, I know
I should have walked over and said hello
It seemed like you were in a hurry
I didn't want to slow you down so
I figured I should let you go
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
See the little children at your knees
I heard you moved back and got a house at East
Everybody says that the war is over
It isn't something you forget so easily
Saw your shit downtown at the gallery
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
Work it out
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
Work it out
Always trying to work it out (Work it out)
The Son, the Sun:
The son
The sun
Dancing and Fire:
I saw you dancing in the "fire it up"
Before your breath and barely audible
It's more a "let it out" than "let it go"
It's not the end, it's just the end of hope
A spark of everything you've ever known
Incinerated in a light of gold
You don't know what you're even fighting for
It's not the first time you delayed the boat
I saw you dancing in the "fire it up"
Before your breath and barely audible
It's more a "let it out" than "let it go"
It's not the end, it's just the end of hope (https://genius.com/Low-white-horses-lyrics)
Poor Sucker:
Some poor sucker
At the bottom of the lake
Took the wrong way up
When the ground began to break
It's a long way back
That's the price you gotta pay
Should've this, should've that
Should've made a list to thank
Should have kept a better track
Put some money in the bank
If your mind's made up
Then there's nothing left to say
All you've given, all you took
All your promise, all your rules
After all you've done
Feed your body to the wolves
It's a lie, it's the truth
Only one thing you can do
You got everything you want
There ain't nothing else to take
Kick your ass right out
What the hell you gonna say
Gonna give it to you fast
Gonna give it to you straight
Yeah, you gonna make him wait
Gonna put you in your place
Gonna leave you in the dark
At the bottom of the lake
It's a long way back
That's the price you gotta pay
All you've given, all you took
All your promise, all your rules
After all you've done
Feed your body to the wolves
It's a lie, it's the truth
Only one thing you can do
Rome (Always in the Dark):
Rome in the ashes
Couldn't even sigh
Even when they have
To make a roundabout
You were higher water
It's happens in the soul
They can fake derision
If we're one and whole
Always in the dark
Rome in the ashes
Couldn't even sigh
Who will even have
To wait the last in line
I got magic water
You can have it all
Let's turn this thing up
Before they take us out
Always in the dark
Rome in the ashes
Couldn't even sigh
Who can make a panic
At the end of night
Warmness that happens
Then they tear you up
Whisper to me crosseyed
If you kill that bird
Always in the dark
Disarray:
Before it falls into total disarray
You'll have to learn to live a different way
Too late to look back on apocryphal verse
And to be something beyond kinder than words
This evil spirit, man, it's bringing me down
It tells me not to do the things that I should
It graduated to the back of the bus
They say you let it in when you took the drugs
Not up for question, it's not even a thought
Another portrait you can hang on the wall
Dissolve into a state of awful inverse
The truth is not something that you have not heard
This evil spirit, man, it's bringing me down
It tells me not to do the things that I should
It graduated to the back of the bus
They say you let it in when you took the drugs
