Mondo Bizarre Magazine Record Reviews

Damien Jurado – The Horizon Just Laughed

Damien Jurado - The Horizon Just Laughed

by Raquel Pinheiro
 
The Horizon Just Laughed, Damien Jurado’ thirteenth album, following the trilogy composed by Maraqopa (2012), 2014 (Brothers and Sisters of the Eternal Son), Visions of Us On the Land (2016).
 
It is a less introspective, gloomy, and psychedelic album than his previous three. A more upbeat journey through the United States states and cities, with most addressed to a different woman. There is also space for writer Thomas Wolfe – Dear Thomas Wolf, Percy Faith and Ray Conniff, leaders of easy-listening orchestras and a few other characters in The Horizon Just Laughed eleven songs.
 
Choosing elegance, sophistication, and a dash of orchestration, without ever going too far, or allowing the songs to get lost in over- arrangements, so that is guitar and voice are always the guideline, Jurado’s manages what is probably his best album to date.
 
Impecable songs, pristine sound, song-writing craftsmanship at its best, and neat and clear production (in what is Jurado’s first self-production) in just under thirty five minutes of beauty, emotion, and well told, sang and played small stories make The Horizon Just Laughed a charming, enchanted album.