Product Description After a year of touring the US in various incarnations, Horse Feathers signed to Kill Rock Stars and proceeded to record this, their second album: House With No Home. On it they have distilled their sound into a brilliant statement of minimalist Americana. Peter and Heather's precisely arranged strings step cautiously in and around Justin's haunting vocal lines, and the economy of music is also reflected in the lyrics a few evocative phrases tell rich stories, each word weighted and delivered with careful purpose. It is an album infused with rare power and emotion, restrained but always present, where the gaps between the notes can be as important as the notes themselves. Review It s funny how music you've never heard before can elicit overwhelming nostalgia. From the moment you hear Portland-based Horse Feathers singer Justin Ringle's croon on their latest album s opener ''Curs in the Weeds,'' it's hard to forget times of serene happiness in your life. It's hard to forget times of youthful bliss, and it's downright disturbingly difficult to forget the impact of young love -- or maybe it's just me.Whether or not the lyrical content of House With No Home matches any of these memories is irrelevant -- Ringle's mumble conjures up surreal scenarios of Tracy Chapman doing Sam Amidon, minus any vocal enunciation; rather, it s the otherworldly music that causes one to get lost in cerebral trauma while driving home alone at night. To be direct, the sound of this album is nothing short of beautiful. Peter and Heather Broderick's string arrangements mimic Aaron Copland s most tender moments, and over Ringle's guitar strumming, the impact is enough to cause the White Witch's icy heart to melt.Listen to ''Rude to Rile'' and you ll find a masterpiece of violin, cello, and percussion. I've listened to this track over and over again, and I felt as though my life story was being told: ''He just waits/ And he hopes and he prays/ But the more she is loved she hurts.'' It makes me wish I had written it, because it feels like I mean it. Yet strangely, it still feels like it could be an old Appalachian folk song; I don t know how, but it does. And it s not as though love lost is my life story, but for a few minutes I'm convinced that it is.The only real problem I have with this album is that it can begin to drag after a while. I feel like I need to be in the mood for it all the time, as the somber intensity of it can be a lot to handle track after track. There isn't much of a change between the songs, but as a complete piece of art, it works seamlessly. It's not 'mushy' or 'whiny' music by any means; it just delicately walks the tightrope between sad and hopeful. On ''Albina,'' Ringle demonstrates how a voice can be blended with music and find its own as an instrument, a technique that reaches its pleading peak on ''Heather's Kiss.'' There are moments that can leave you bored, but there are moments where you can forget what you re doing entirely. The songs beg to be heard, and the most you can do it listen.If you like gorgeous folk, then this album is for you. If you don't, well, The Hold Steady released something not that long ago. --Tiny Mix Tapes...At their best, Horse Feathers are essential listening to anyone interested in folk music, acoustic music, whatever broad general category you want to put them under. ''Heathens Kiss'' is still under five minutes, but works in a scope and scale they haven t really essayed before and the effect is stunning, especially when the song bows down and slows its pirouetting strings for Ringle to gently intone, ''Heathens kiss, softly''. ''Helen'' sounds almost like a swooning love song until you pay closer attention to the lyrics (''Helen if you come, I think you know I'll go / Much the same way the sun steals the snow''). The way that chorus unfolds out of the record s most insular arrangement, with half the vocals whispered in the background, is a sublime moment of a kind you're going to get from no other band... --PopmattersIt's only September, but all the leaves are already brown for Horse Feathers. Winter is manifest in the trio's second album, House With No Home, a collection rife lyrically with snowflakes and slate-gray skies looming over equally chilling folk arrangements augmented with chamber-style strings. Singer Justin Ringle often muffles his words or loses them altogether (as though a wool scarf were covering his mouth) as he trudges through cadences reminiscent of Ryan Adams or Iron & Wine's Sam Beam, delicately dotting his stanzas with multi-dimensional characters weathering the winters of their existence.Which is more enriching than it sounds. Although the setting has shifted to the rural Pacific Northwest, the storytelling here is akin to author Russell Banks's bleak yet poignant portraits of lower-class life in frozen New Hampshire. Banjo-driven ''Working Poor'' is most explicit in this task: ''We all bend/We all break/We all forfeit what we make.'' House resonates most when it focuses on more universal themes of alienation -- losing a child, failure that runs in the family, adultery, obscenity, and, of course, seasonal depression -- and lays them bare for dissemination. Without the lyric sheet handy, finding some sunshine in Peter and Heather Broderick's expert arrangements is possible, if barely: As Ringle's backing corps, they break from their cool elegance only once, for a few tumultuous notes sliding out of tune amid cymbal crashes in ''Albina,'' perhaps an unhappy ode to gentrification. As quickly as this strident moment appears, though, it's gone. Meanwhile, Ringle's closest approximation of a lyrical wink shows up in ''Helen,'' wherein he turns the prospect of feeling better into an artistic dilemma: ''What will I write when I'm fine?'' In the meantime, he certainly won't run out of material. --Village Voice