(Psychedelic Rock, Folk Rock, Experimental) Charalambides - Exile - 2011, MP3, 320 kbps

Charalambides is an avant garde musical group originally from Houston, Texas, USA and lately of Austin, Texas. Formed in 1991 (under the short-lived name Mutual Admiration Society) by Tom Carter, Christina Carter and Kyle Silfer, they have followed in the footsteps of other Texas psychedelic music artists such as the 13th Floor Elevators, Red Crayola, and Jandek. Later members include Jason Bill and Heather Leigh Murray, but the band has long considered itself primarily a duo between Tom and Christina Carter.

Exile is the new Charalambides album. Five years in the making, it was recorded between 2006 and 2010 in various locations in New Hampshire, western Massachusetts and New York City, mixed at Black Dirt Studios, and mastered at Sand with Paul Gold. The group remains the core duo of Christina and Tom Carter, with contributions on one track by the string section of Helena Espvall and Margarida Garcia.
Deeply imbued with the full historical spectrum of american folk and blues song form, Exile is a tapestry of suppliant invocations directed at the heart of the unseen spiritual forces surrounding us. Dense arrangements and thickly-overdubbed tracks sit side-by-side with material that ranks among the sparest and most skeletal the group has recorded, giving Exile the psychic scope of their classic Market Square album while building on the refinements of the more recent Likeness and A Vintage Burden releases.
This album quite coincidentally marks Charalambides' 20th anniversary, as it was the fall of 1991 when they first started playing, and they made their live debut in December of that year. Since their last album, Tom Carter has released a series of collaborations and solo works on a wide array of labels, while Christina Carter has been steadily releasing her solo work through labels including her own Many Breaths imprint.