græ

græ finds him trying to be, well, everything, and through a convergence of folk, jazz, classical, and art-rock, along with his probing lyricism, Sumney has managed to produce a sonic marvel.

Grӕ is so rich in content and so vast in musicality it would be impossible to unpack everything in a single review. It is complex yet universal – comforting yet unsettling. It lives in an incorporeal realm of its own, and somehow, Sumney has gained complete and utter command over it.

Shifting from pounding rock to experimental jazz at a feather’s touch, the album’s sonics provide the theatrical soundscape to Sumney’s words, rising and falling in line with his crystalline tones.

Moses Sumney and Mike Hadreas have made the albums of our strange quarantine season — bleak but tender, sprawling yet intricately detailed, as suffused with the need for physical contact as they are alert to its dangers and prohibitions. ... Stunning art-soul record. ... Yet as busy as the music can occasionally feel, both albums keep close track of the singers’ voices, which always merit the attention.

A few skippable songs don’t change the scale of Sumney’s accomplishment. With an auspicious debut in his rearview mirror and a blinding future ahead, he made an album that crystalizes the current state of his art and advances his worldview while at the same time clearing a path for whatever he wants to do next. Perhaps the only thing more exciting than græ will be seeing where Moses Sumney goes from here.

“Græ” is a magnificent, multi-genre mess in a dress of many colors — the greyness of its monochrome title notwithstanding — and not just possibly 2020’s literally biggest album, across its double-album sprawl, but also one of the year’s boldest and best.

Where Aromanticism was intimate and sleek, græ is rangy, sprawling, a riot of moods from lustful to angry to broken-hearted. ... The most powerful moments on græ examine the distance between this wariness and the loneliness it produces.

For all of the purposefully oblique subject matter, the album never once feels indirect or opaque. ... His voice is multiply expressive, both in the way that a singer/songwriter’s voice in its lyrical accent would be, and in the way that someone like Daniel Lopatin’s production would expectedly turn a voice into beautiful putty.

The intensity and diversity of Part 1 hinted at even more bombastic and unexpected songs to come on Part 2, which instead mostly continues the sound he already mastered on Aromanticism. It’s not that Part 2’s songs aren’t gorgeous and poignant; it’s just that, given Sumney’s unwavering focus on shattering longtime boundaries, Part 2’s songs occupy shockingly familiar musical territory.

He knows that being the most complete version of himself requires lifelong searching – græ never fails to feel like such a journey. [Aug 2020, p.63]

Græ is a textural wonder, with soft electric guitars, Sumney’s beautiful voice, and glittering synths making up most of the album’s heavenly sounding songs.

It’s hard to imagine many of its songs being performed onstage, even before the pandemic — even as it encompasses more sonic possibilities, from the orchestral to the surreal. ... Sumney doesn’t have to explain himself in prose. His songs do it even better.

An emotionally ambitious 20-track built on pain, vulnerability and self-identity.

When the album shifts into its second part, and turns inwards with a slower pace to match its vulnerable introspection, there’s no jolt: Sumney’s voice ensures that his soundscapes melt together. It’s here that the emotional heft is to be found.

Comes awfully close to the masterwork he so clearly gunning to make. [Jun 2020, p.38]