Even before opening up the package, it’s pretty obvious that this release is a very personal operation. The gorgeous letterpressed cover holds artwork by Ms. Paul’s mother, a lovely abstract ink drawing with blotches of color evocative of sunset, or an Eastern-inspired print. Stuffed in a little pocket inside are an assortment of colorful letterpressed cards containing credits and more little abstract art pieces, commemorating an edition of 300. The music on the disc is just as individual, well-chosen, and consistently compelling.

The songs lurch forward on a wobbly sound bed that often contains scraped and plucked strings, ringing percussion and bells, and squeaking cymbals, a full tonal palette with just enough quirk to balance its darkness. This cacophony is dense and chaotic, but always clearly structured—a slide whistle might appear for just a moment among accordion swells, as on “One One,” and the dynamic continually breathes in and out—dragging ahead, then cycling back to catch up with itself. There is heaviness, restlessness, a sense of struggle, as the songs threaten to coalesce but never quite do. Ms. Paul plays everything on this disc, and her subtle use of overdubs reflects a compositional logic at once chaotic and completely focused on realizing some Quixotic vision.

Beyond all this, the focus is on Ms. Paul’s saxophone, which squeaks breathily and hovers over the top in long sustained tones, sometimes doubled as in “Blank,” that occasionally spill over into miniature crescendos. She’s capable of being dark and vaguely unsettling in “At Last (Least),” squealing out clusters of high-register notes that just hint at a jazz influence. She occasionally intones wordless vocals as well, luring songs like “Ask Me” into very intimate and perhaps sorrowful spaces.

There are a lot of instruments credited here, and all the songs seem to feature everything. There’s a consistency among the tunes, with everything reassembled over and over into some remarkably evocative collages. To me, this is a take on contemporary Improv, with its inventive play on acoustic instruments and focus on dynamics instead of narrative, that’s completely her own, but almost shocking in its subtle inventiveness. 9/10 -- Travis Bird (28 July, 2010)