Tigress by Coppice Halifax

In the latter half of 2019, a talented Finnish painter privately commissioned me to write and record an album that sounded like "High Hawaiian Fog at sunset" alongside a few other particular reference points, such as the Ocean Lion recordings. Tigress, a two-hour double-album, is what followed in the last months of the year, keeping me warm in the studio as the temperatures outside went from cool to colder and the leaves fell beneath the weight of Winter rainfall. I finally finished the work in January, and at the request of the patron whose support and initiative willed it into existence, I am issuing it publicly as well. Sonically, Tigress resembles the wave-stained shorelines and sunken orchestras of albums like High Hawaiian Fog and Ocean Lion, but is also designed to be much more dynamic and dense, with many different moving parts that initially do not reveal themselves in the sun-coated sea wash of melodic haze. Sun Cast, Swaying Palms and Pawleys Island are all close enough to be felt, if not heard, as well.

Indeed, the ship has left port, the tide has come rushing back in, bringing with it artifacts from tragic wrecks and merfolk magicks hidden inside colorful shells, as the sun finally sets upon an orange sand island, and we stand beneath the gradually inkstained sky, hand in hand, watching the light sink beneath the surface, claimed once more by the longing of seafoam ghosts and beautiful sirens, dowsing the light in a thousand salty tears, dispersing it as glitter-crested waves that gently crash upon our knees. You and I both know there's never any going back, that nothing can ever be the sweet sameness of that oft-romanced before, that the swamp takes everything back eventually...but the rusting bells of memory call us just the same, heralding that hopeless search back to the softened lens of our nostalgic recall, chiming in perfect unison their distant hail, pulling us out onto the waves again like the lonesome sirens, for one more trip to those golden ruins beneath the empty sea.

Tracklist

1.	Tigress	9:59

2.	Suncoated	10:37

3.	Port Map	9:00

4.	Imperial Rust	12:05

5.	Suncastle [Venice In Blurs]	15:38

6.	Any Are	2:20

7.	Night In Green	9:34

8.	Euphrates	12:10

9.	Ritual & Remembrance	5:44

10.	Night In Blue	8:52

11.	Soft Breath On Cracked Marble	20:26

Credits

released February 14, 2020

W/P by Brian Grainger. Privately commissioned by Anni Roenkae. Recorded at the White Pillar Workshop, 2019-2020. Mastered by The Analog Botanist. Paintings courtesy of Anni Roenkae. Initial design by ABM&D / Final design and layout by Robert Trifu. Text companion written by Brian Grainger. This is Milieu Music number MMD052. (C) + (P) Milieu Music 2020. All nights preserved.

License