Watchhouse (Mandolin Orange) Blindfaller LP (Clear Orange Vinyl)

Lean in to Watchhouse's album Blindfaller, and it's bound to happen. You'll suddenly pick up on the power and devastation lurking in its quietude, the doom hiding beneath its unvarnished beauty. You'll hear the way it magnifies the intimacy at the heart of the North Carolina duo's music, as if they created their own musical language as they recorded it.

"We talked about the feel of each song and pointed out loosely who was going to be taking solos, but it was mostly a lot of fresh takes, a lot of eye contact, and a lot of nods and weird winks," says Andrew Marlin, who anchors the band with fellow multi-instrumentalist and singer Emily Frantz.

As the duo's songwriter, Marlin sharpens his lyrical prowess here, touching on broad themes of growing older and feeling helpless in a world torn by injustice. Sure, the album sounds classic, but it is rooted in the here and now of our daily headlines.

On their fifth album, 2016's Blindfaller, Mandolin Orange once again show they have a true gift for keeping one foot in the past and the other in the present day. Group founders Andrew Marlin and Emily Frantz can harmonize with a casual but emphatic touch that sounds Appalachian at one moment, and like modern-day Big City folkies at the next. Marlin's mandolin and Frantz's fiddle work a similar magic, clearly inspired by vintage bluegrass and mountain music but also with a touch of the smoky drift of psychedelia when the music floats along a cloud of twang and reverb....Blindfaller finds Mandolin Orange taking some strong steps forward while keeping a close watch on what they do best, and this music should please old fans while intriguing new ones.