Vetiver - Vetiver

Vetiver is named for an aromatic East Indian grass that grows in California, and their music delivers on the sunny, hazy sweetness the band’s name suggests. Singer Andy Cabic has—with some help from Devendra Banhart—written a set of songs that at their best are strange, subdued and otherworldly, a quality you can’t fake. The album starts with “Oh Papa,” a song so hauntingly subdued you almost have to lean over the speakers to catch its subtle nuances; Cabic’s voice lures you in, like a less showy Jeff Buckley, and the rest of the songs unfold like a dream. There’s the rapturous “Without a Song” (with a tapping-break in the middle that’s unlike anything I’ve heard), the jaunty “Farther On,” and the complex epics that make up the album’s last half, with a detour for the goofy “Amour Fou” (co-written with Banhart). This is folk music that combines the ghostly power of scratchy blues 78s with the epic swirl of My Bloody Valentine or Mazzy Star (members of which make guest appearances).