Album Review: Until the Hunter by Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions

Even though this is Hope Sandoval and Colm O’Coisog’s third album together, The Warm Inventions continue to be assessed from the under the shadow of their respective histories. Sandoval’s time in Mazzy Star and O’Coisog’s with My Bloody Valentine is significant of course, but The Warm Inventions is an entirely different beast altogether. There’s a fair amount of shimmering going on admittedly, but that’s about as far as comparisons can stretch.

Full Review >>

Hope Sandoval isn't the quickest worker, it took Mazzy Star almost 20 years to put out their fourth album, and this record comes seven years after the last one she made with Colm Ó Cíosóig under the Warm Inventions name. Despite the time it took to arrive, Until the Hunter is no great departure for the duo. It features many hushed, lit-by-candlelight ballads, loads of quiet beauty, and Sandoval's timelessly beautiful singing.

Full Review >>

Hope Sandoval and Colm O’Coisog are both in bands that like to take their time. On their third album together as Hope Sandoval and The Warm Inventions, Until the Hunter, they’ve composed a set of beguiling songs that do likewise. Sandoval’s group Mazzy Star had a seventeen year gap between 2013s Seasons of Your Day and its predecessor Among My Swan.

Full Review >>

For an outfit featuring members of two of the dreamiest guitar bands around, the name Hope Sandoval & The Warm Inventions leaves only a little bit of room for mystery. The duo comprises the Mazzy Star vocalist and Colm Ó Cíosóig of My Bloody Valentine — the latter taking on a name that conveys well the soft sparks of their music — though Sandoval’s vocals are the key player here. And, considering their endlessly crystalline qualities, how could it be any other way? With their third album together, Sandoval and Ó Cíosóig let her vocals ring, shading them in the many shades of gray between subtle warmth and sighing melancholy.

Full Review >>

“It’s not so precious; it’s just a song. It’s just art and art is nothing. Art is not precious, anybody can do it. A five-year-old can do it. It’s not a big deal.”– Hope Sandoval Alot of people seem to be unplugging now, and it’s a bracing sort of peace. But that tense stillness ….

Full Review >>

“Under the Hunter,” the third album from Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions, opens with longing, specifically the sort of late-hour want that brings foggy memories to the brain’s forefront. As woozy drums and droning synths gently nudge along “Into the Trees,” Sandoval folds into herself, her precise enunciation of the first two verses fading into her murmuring “ohh, I miss you” as if it were her mantra. As her presence blends into the atmosphere, the keyboards’ electric tang becomes more alive, more menacing.

Full Review >>