***"R.E. Seraphin’s songs live in shadows and ambiguity. The Bay Area musician builds raucous, large-scale rock songs, then hushes them to ghostliness around intimate, murmuring vocals that tickle the inside of your ear. Here are anthemic choruses, amp-jumping rock licks and buzzing propulsion that echo through dream corridors, just out of reach.
Fool’s Mate is Seraphin’s second-full length under his own name, following the debut Tiny Shapes from 2020 and a pair of EPs, A Room Forever and Swingshift. Denser, darker and more rock-oriented than his previous material, it was recorded with Jason Quever of the Papercuts at his home studio in Crockett, California.
Seraphin had been playing with a full band as the lockdown eased, and this album reflects the live chemistry that he’s developed with his crew: guitarist Joel Cusumano (Sob Stories, Body Double), drummer Daniel Pearce (Al Harper, Reds, Pinks, & Purples), bass player Josh Miller (Chime School, Extra Classic), and keyboardist Luke Robbins. Seraphin, Pearce and Miller ]== recorded the basic tracks live, then added Robbins’ keyboards in overdubs. In addition, Seraphin’s frequent collaborator Owen Adair Kelley of Sleepy Sun contributed acoustic and slide guitars, while his wife Hannah Moriah sang background harmonies.
It is very much a rock album, with big Spector-esque arrangements and squalling guitar solos. And yet, it also digs into the shifting currents of the subconscious, incorporating snatches of dreams, half-remembered phrases from books and warped memories and imaginings into its textures. 'The lyrics are meant to evoke a sense of corporeality—there...
