True-to-form on Night Palace, Phil Elverum (the one-man genius behind Mount Eerie; formerly The Microphones) manages to find profundity in the smallest of life's mundanities, like characterizing the periods between breaths as little moments of death on "Breaths" or metaphorizing chunks of straw fallen from an old broom as the impermanence of our existence in the universe with "Broom of Wind". Yes, our meaning as living, breathing beings on earth is unsolvable, but this is its beauty. Our existence is a miracle. The planet around us is a miracle. What needs further explanation?

Every song here feels like a small revelation about life's unexplainable"bigger picture". Like all great artists, Phil doesn't provide stern answers to his monumental questions or skirt around the all-too-real horrors of the present state of the world with disingenuous hipster vomit. Instead, like a warm forest campfire on a vacant cold night, he provides a much-needed moment of catharsis before we're able to pick back up, take a deep breath, and return into the darkness.

Favorite Track:

Non-Metaphorical Decolonization