Half Shadow - "Moonless (Unmoored)"

Exploring the liminal states between the inner and outer ocean and the way the moon exerts influence over each, Jesse Carsten aka Half Shadow provides an engaging exploration of this crossroads with “Moonless (Unmoored” from the album At Home with My Candles on Bud Tapes / Dove Cove Records. Using “Moonless” as an introduction to Carsten’s work we hear delicate finger-picked guitar, soaring and squealing violin (John Cale / Tony Conrad come to mind here) and Carsten’s oddly timed delivery seem to nestle into each other in a natural cadence. From the press release, “"Moonless" tests the boundary between the interior and the infinite, in which Carsten repetitively incants “what door can you open onto timeless shore? / an ocean breathes in a midnight, / moonless and unmoored.” Something more profound and unexpected haunts this space, an uncanny presence worthy of devotion. With an ecstatic tenderness, Carsten’s lyrics come to chant this living unknown. "Moonless" also calls on the listener to inquire within themselves, in their secret, shy self, what their true vision consists of; what their soul is really made of.”