I have to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of instrumental music. It's not necessarily that I don't enjoy it; it's just that I find it far easier to connect to vocals or lyrics, which makes it difficult for me to engage with instrumental music as anything more than pleasant background noise. For that reason, I was surprised to be so immediately gripped by Never Were the Way She Was, a total enthrallment that lasted until the very last note of the album. Saxophonist Stetson and violinist Neufeld are capable of producing sounds from their instruments like I've never heard before, and the way they meld together, twisting and sliding and warping around one another, is jaw-droppingly complex and textured - which makes the fact that the album was apparently recorded live, without overdubs or loops, all the more impressive.

I'm not even going to pretend to understand half of what is going on here on a technical level because I'll just embarrass myself with my lack of knowledge. All I know is that very few albums in the past year have elicited the visceral emotional response I have while listening to Never Were the Way She Was. At times, it's achingly beautiful, but just as often, it's terrifyingly bleak. Stetson and Neufeld are more concerned with atmosphere and mood than crafting safe or pleasing sounds, and the result is almost apocalyptic, as dark and ominous as the album's cover suggests. From this palette of varied moods, a compelling story unfolds, even without the benefit of words to tell it.

"The Sun Roars Into View" opens the album with bright, optimistic violin that soon marries with saxophone in a dizzying tango of sound that is almost flirtatious, a playful and cunning back-and-forth that stretches across seven and a half minutes. However, as the ragged timbre of the saxophone battles for dominance, a dark undercurrent is revealed. In this sense, the sinuous and winding "Won't Be a Thing to Become" serves as the uneasy calm before the storm that is gathering on the horizon. It fully arrives in the lengthy trio of songs beginning on "With the Dark Hug of Time," a minimalistic composition built on shuddering, eerie violin and saxophone that strains, creaks, and bellows as sinisterly as an unknown presence in a horror film. Afterward, "The Rest of Us" goes fully dystopian, cycling through multiple haunting movements, Stetson and Neufeld so fully intertwined that the line where one instrument ends and the other begins becomes blurred, especially when accompanied by a recurring ghostly vocal harmony. The mournful title track plays out like the aftermath of the chaos and destruction that precedes it, meandering and rootless.

Never Were the Way She Was is an album of impressive talent and ambition, but it's also a potent whirlwind of emotion. Stetson and Neufeld are both accomplished musicians in their own right, but, together, they've managed to create something truly awe-inspiring. I'm not sure if they have plans to work together again in the future, but I'm certainly looking forward to it if they do.

(Youtube* / Amazon / iTunes)
*Live performance. Utterly mesmerizing, highly recommended.