Between a lot of travel and my continuing addiction to Mr. Beast, I haven't bought anything new since that record. Last week, though, I picked up a record that had been on my "to investigate" list for a while, by a group called Neverending White Lights. The only thing I knew about them when I bought the record was that they're Canadian -- or so I thought. Actually, "they" aren't a band at all, as such. Neverending White Lights is a project spearheaded by a fellow named Daniel Victor, a Canadian, but most of the tracks are collaborations with other artists, some from as far afield as Scotland. The collaborators are usually vocalists, though I was interested to note that Mogwai (see? Scotland!) supplied music (I don't know how much) for the album. My love affair with Mogwai continues!

Now that I've given away the ending: Act I: Goodbye Friends of the Heavenly Bodies is good. Even though each song has a different singer, the album remains cohesive, which I can only credit to what must be Victor's strong sense of musical direction. The album is laid back, but more in the way of latter-days Moist than something more groovy like Zero 7. In parts it reminds me of Chris Vrenna's 2 A.M. Wake-Up Call, released under the pseudonym Tweaker; there are blends of instrumental and electronic components that strike that same sort of aural chord. Neverending White Lights are much more consistently uplifting than Vrenna, though that's hardly surprising given that the latter became famous as one of the founding memebrs of Nine Inch Nails.

At 16 tracks and 79 minutes, this is one you may not have time to focus on from start to finish all that often. However, unlike many other albums that come in at 14 tracks or more, Act I doesn't have any tracks that I think of as "filler" or skip over consistently (though there are a few tracks, mostly enumerated below, that I often skip to when I just want to hear one or two tracks).

Victor is apparently working on a solo album now, and with the reasonable commercial success of Act I in Canada, is also reported to be looking at Act II. I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for both.

The Record: Act I: Goodbye Friends of the Heavenly Bodies (Neverending White Lights), 2006
One-line verdict: Mellow, yet varied.
Standount Tracks: From What I Once Was, A Littlepiece, The Grace, Life Is A Dead Scene