Demarnia Lloyd
Trace (Arclife, 135 High St., Dunedin, New Zealand)
by Marc Hirsh
Demarnia Lloyd
Trace (Arclife, 135 High St., Dunedin, New Zealand)
by Marc Hirsh
originally published in Space City Rock, Fall 2002
Demarnia Lloyd's three songs (solo and with Cloudboy and Mink) on 1997's entrancing Arc: Music of Dunedin compilation were mightily intriguing, warm ripples of slow motion underneath her somnambulent contralto. Trace is nothing like those cuts, but instead of shoehorning her gifts into commercialized product, the New Zealander runs like hell in the other direction. The home recordings that make up her debut EP are perplexingly oblique, little more than wheezy (literally, as some of the instruments sound as though they're on their last legs) baroque flourishes on a seemingly endless loop. On top of this is Lloyd's voice, multi-tracked (in nothing resembling traditional harmony) and murmuring cryptic poetry in a breathy timbre that sounds like Björk taking a short lunch with Cat Power and Hope Sandoval. It's captivating for a while, as Lloyd sounds as though she's drunk on the sheer delight of experimenting with the possibilities of her voice; she sings in what I'd swear are microtones in spots during "Anything," and the swoops in "Flying" are reminiscent of that dog. at their most vocally playful. Unfortunately, the instrumental backdrops don't show nearly as much invention (beyond the nontraditional arrangements and production), and the songs demonstrate nothing resembling movement. Even "Resonance," which is like Belly taking on the organ outro to Led Zeppelin's "Thank You," barely meets the requirements to be called a song, even as it stands, when taken as pure sound, as one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard. Like the rest of Trace, its beauty lies in stasis.