The first cold morning.
The day the season turns and you notice. Five records with the same clarity in them.
There is a specific morning every year when the air changes and you can suddenly hear further. These records have that quality built in — recorded close, mixed dry, with more space than sound. This is not sad music, though some of it is sad. It is music with the humidity taken out.
The picks
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1
Either/Or
Elliott Smith · 1997
Either/Or is Elliott Smith at his most double-tracked and least decorated — two guitars, two voices, nothing else in the room. The clearest-sounding record he made.
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2
The Glow Pt. 2
The Microphones · 2001
The Glow Pt. 2 was recorded to sound like weather: hiss, distance, sudden loudness. It is the rare album where the fidelity is the feeling.
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3
Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill
Grouper · 2008
Grouper buries the songs under tape haze until they read as landscape rather than performance. Put it on at first light and it will not intrude once.
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4
Moon Pix
Cat Power · 1998
Moon Pix was written in one night and sounds like it — unhurried, slightly haunted, every guitar part left exactly as played. Cat Power's most atmospheric record.
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5
Mark Hollis
Mark Hollis · 1998
Mark Hollis made one solo album, recorded almost entirely acoustically in a room you can hear the size of, and then stopped. The quietest record anyone will recommend to you.