Time Is Glass

Though Chasny’s folkier inclinations generally prevail over Six Organs’ equal affection for psych explosions, it’s still thrilling to hear him set the controls for the big red sun in the final minutes of “Summer’s Last Rays”. [May 2024, p.41]

Time Is Glass is lovely music — that much should be no surprise to anyone — but beyond that, it taps into something invisible, deep and important. Is it too much to say that these songs manifest the divine? Maybe so, but let’s stipulate at least that they’re trying.

Time is Glass is both a pretty great Six Organs of Admittance album and a pretty great album full stop. Though its more committed embrace of British folk music is a double-edged sword – risking a smattering of beautiful but forgettable instrumental parts – the overall effect is mesmerizing, an album that allows its composer’s voice to shine through in new and often more elaborate ways.

You still never know from one song what might appear on the next, or even where the song you’re listening to might go, and it keeps the music fresh even when it’s retreading hallowed ground.

On first glance one might mistake it for a kind of "playing the hits" trick that many artists rely on as they revisit their origins. But digging in, Time Is Glass feels more like a progression of ease — 20 years on, Chasny is able to reach the astral plane the way most reach for a light switch.