Tapir! and their journey find a lot of consistent footing in their strong indie folk melodies, warm instrumentation, pristine production, and mystic arc. ‘Their Pilgrim, Their God and The King of My Decrepit Mountain’ may come a bit blurry, yet there is enough fascinating wonder to be found in this upward trek.
‘The Pilgrim, Their God, and the King of My Decrepit Mountain’ is a project long being worked on by the UK 6-piece Tapir!, writing and composing over its concept and aesthetic flair through a methodical release of EPs that will lead up to all of the project’s engrossing story. A journey that’s worth working on, just like a pilgrim in their way to keep their chin forward and trudge along the road to find the way wherein they’ll find the destination that they are looking for. It’s a descriptive comparison that very much works on Tapir! And their 2-year long journey of putting this project together, finally completing the third chapter of their project and piecing together the three EPs into one holistic picture.
Set within 3 acts with 4 cuts each, this composed flow allows the album to have a cohesive, focused structure all across the board, all constructed with the band’s pristine indie-folk instrumentation that pulses through and through. With its consistent ray of textures and production, they allow the melodies and the performances to shine across the project, all with their own varied presentations. Starting on ‘On A Grassy Knoll (We’ll Bow Together)’ opens up the project’s sweeping flourish with the quick taps of percussions underscoring the glimmering tones coming from the horns, synths, backing vocals, and Ike’s very own solemn singing. This varied flair carries on differently in the other two acts, whether that be the moody strings that come up on ‘Broken Ark’ and ‘Gymnopedie’ just before the noisy feedback from the electric guitar tears through the atmosphere, and the ascending post-rock swell of ‘Mountain Song’ that really ends the project on its highest peak.
The sonic tapestry of this project is also defined through the stripped-back moments peppered with their own soft charm. Cuts like ‘The Nether (Face To Face)’ and ‘My God’ carry lilting breaths of guitar strums, spare keys, and airy melodic twists that take its tunes to a meditative edge, providing a sense of gentle atmosphere to the album’s more emotional pieces. ‘Eidolon’ and ‘Untitled’ follow similar relaxing feelings, yet the tones are now carried through the warmth of the male and female vocal harmonies alongside the simpler guitar progressions that might be spare, but the compositions themselves are strong enough to make them stand out alongside the instrumentally layered tracks of the project. Consistently strong on both production and composition aspects that it does alleviate a few minor issues on the project: mainly the few tunes like ‘Swallow’ and ‘Gymnopedie’ that carry the weaker melodies from the bunch, and the programmed percussion that don’t always carry a strong momentum for these songs even if they’re really well blended with the organic instrumentation.
The structure of this album paints a journey of what seemed like a simplistic story of a pilgrim traveling far and beyond various sceneries, observing and interacting with different creatures and figures as the pilgrim reaches their destination, yet the arc does start to show interesting details once you read between the lines. As the journey continues, there is a sense of hesitation about the destination, where the heaven that was destined for the pilgrim might become nothing more than falsehoods, and thus starts swerving the arc into something else entirely. Specifically, the third act narratively goes towards the objects that have now been cherished religiously, foreshadowing the demise of a heavenly utopia that is now replaced with praise for the materialistic, eventually coloring the ending of the pilgrim’s journey where it might have unveiled why they went to get through the trek in the first place: to find that healing utopia that will fulfill what they’ve been wanting for quite some time that might have now changed after discovering every individual cherishing the materialistic, eventually ending the project with the pilgrim yearning for the materialistic as well, never that healing concept of utopia that they may have longed for in the past. It’s a narrative that might not exactly have the clearest thematic arc as the overall details of the project can blur and smudge, resulting in the writing becoming impressionistic and mystic. Not exactly an off-putting aspect as the writing still comes off sharp, but the aforementioned mystic quality means that picking out the meaning within this writing requires more time to sink in.
A 2-year long journey that is worth the time and sweat put into it, ‘The Pilgrim, Their God, and the King of my Decrepit Mountain’ is a debut project that goes on a folk-leaning pilgrimage that carries itself consistently and firmly into its concept, aesthetic, and compositional structure. It admires the journey that’s being shown and provides thematic nuance on the project’s three-act ride, combined with strong folk tunes with terrific production that makes the stifling digital drums blend naturally with the organic instrumentation. With this project done and out in the world, the trip that Tapir! partakes in has enough beauty to recognize the fascinating aspects during that trek. This is just the first of many journeys that Tapir! Will go through, where perhaps the stories they’ll encounter have even more fascinating territories to uncover.
Favorite Tracks: ‘On A Grassy Knoll (We’ll Bow Together)’, ‘The Nether (Face To Face)’, ‘Broken Ark’, ‘Eidolon’, ‘Untitled’, ‘My God’, ‘Mountain Song’
Least Favorite Track: ‘Swallow’