Ice promise

Image: Camille Solyagua

Sheets - Promise and the Monster

This afternoon, feverish and bundled in blankets on the sofa, I watched the migration of a murder of crows. Or, I should say, I watched a very short leg of their journey (and though murder is the correct term and these birds were ginormous, they didn't appear life-threatening). The weary ones settled in a naked tree, their spindle legs tightroping brittle branches, gelid eyes scanning the fresh-laundered sheet of snow. Others, eager to get on with it, flew anxious laps of the block, beating black wings against sifting snow. Ten minutes later they pushed south again.

Promise and the Monster's album Transparent Knives is a delightful late-year surprise from glassine-voiced chanteuse Billie Lindahl. She plays guitar with the patience and rigor, tremble and spellbindery (not to mention consistency -- there isn't a dud track on the record) of her countryman and soon-to-be tourmate, José González. See PatM's Myspace page for various Swedish dates beginning next Tuesday. And buy the album from Imperial Recordings or (much cheaper) on iTunes. It's very, very good.