Out of the wreckage that is now post-rock only a few maintain a personality close to the genre?s original characteristics. When Simon Reynolds coined the term to describe Bark Psychosis? debut album ?Hex? he envisioned a genre which progressed from the traditional rocksong format into unknown territory, stretching space and time, using instruments in different ways to different ends. It was adventurous and exciting and it?s kind of sad that a vast legion of Mogwai and Godspeed You! Black Emperor rip offs define post-rock today, all creaming over the pages of the Ultimate Guide to the Best Crescendo Eva, moving the genre towards a musical wasteland, the genre without a future. A dead end.

Luckily there are a few bands around that could be defined as post-rock, or just instrumental music if you wish, still aiming for the unknown, the exciting and adventurous. Grails, out of Portland, Oregon definately is such a band, combining a heavy stoner groove sensibility with added Eastern melodies to create a purple shrouded post-rock den.
?Take Refuge in Clean Living?, their fifth full length release, is a perfect example of an improving band, eager to learn from previous adventures while still adding different moves along the way.

If the title didn?t tell you already, ?Stoned at the Taj Again?, is the album?s perfect opener. A heavy bass riff plodding along at mid-tempo while the band?s two guitarists lay out a web of swirling fingerpicked melodies. The breakdown in the middle is exemplary for a band like Grails, there?s no rushing, everything is based on groove and rhythm rather than build up and crescendo.

Their previous effort, ?Burning Off Impurities?, already displayed Grails as more than just a post-rock band. And again, on this album, the mishmash of raga like drones that start off ?11th Hour? and ?Take Refuge?, the complex rhythms and fusion like drumming of Emil Amos (who joined OM recently) and the heady vibe throughout make Grails almost unclassifiable. There?s no boundaries, just adventure. And for us, listeners, there are big pay offs, like the massive organ sounds that enter ?Take Refuge? halfway to transform the track into a ridiculously rewarding spacegroove. Just hop on that cloud, inhale a bit of that smoke and zone out to those grooves man. Sick. 8/10 -- Joris Heemskerk (13 May, 2008)