Half Light

WEIRD FEELING
CAN'T EXPLAIN


I have never seen The Mothman Prophecies, and it's only years after I'd first heard Low's "Half Light" (which plays over the credits, apparently) that I've become intrigued about it. I always knew "Half Light" was from that movie when I downloaded it; the version you can hear in the video above is the single mix, and the MP3 I have is the near seven-minute end credits mix. It's even creepier, with someone (Alan? IMDB tells me they're by "Indrid Cold," but you'll forgive my skepticism) whispering away in the background in a way that makes headphone listening a little uncomfortable. The track, as might be guessed from the unusual-for-the-time attack and drum loop of "Half Light," is a collaboration with tomandandy who did the score which takes up the second disc(!) of the OST, which I am seriously considering putting a reservation in for at work. "Half Light" is a great track, and I'm at least mildly intrigued by the rest of the selections.

Tomandandy also, at least according to Wikipedia, "redefined the way in which music for media was created by appropriating aesthetics of the avant-garde and bringing them into pop culture" which is an idea I'm deeply, deeply ambivalent about. But on "Half Light" I'm happy enough with them - they mainly give Mimi a beat she can ride, as far as I can make out, and she does a fantastic job. Alan's guitar is similarly oddly satisfying, as coming over half a year before even Trust "Half Light" is further preliminary evidence that Low can do things assumed to be outside their zone of comfort/competance and in fact do them quite well. The loping beat and some of Mimi's backing vocals (at her spectral best) make me think of trip hop, but the rest of the track is too active and crunchy for that to really hold. It wouldn't really fit on any of Low's albums, and I'm not wholly surprised that the A Lifetime of Temporary Relief didn't grab either "Half Light," as it doesn't collect Low's other collaborations either (most notably the In the Fishtank disc with the Dirty Three).

"Half Light" isn't quite as creepy as some of Low's own songs, mainly because it seems to be trying to weird us out (although, yeah, "Indrid Cold" does get to me sometimes), but it's incredibly successful at the time I downloaded it (back when the movie came out, after hearing a snippet in an ad or something similar) as an expansion of the band's sound. I never thought this was the direction Low was moving in, and I'm not upset I was right about that, but anyone who thinks they only work one way or can only successfully make one type (or speed) of song should check out "Half Light."

Also, that video above? Was my first inkling, post Things We Lost in the Fire and Secret Name, of just how creepy Alan can be. In the context of the band's other albums and further examination of tracks like "Don't Understand" his demeanor in the "Half Light" clip would seem more in line with his normal persona, but at the time I mostly thought of him (and Low in general) as a fairly positive/reassuring/uplifting act, possibly in a kind of holdover from thinking of them as a Christian band. While Alan and Mimi's songs often manage to make me feel uplifted or similarly good, it's not because they're treacly or even very positive; "bleak" is probably an underused word to describe Low's music, even if that's at least partly because it runs the risk of being heard as a pejorative instead of the praise that it's intended to be. As for the video, I imagine the two of them had a lot of fun making it, not that they ever break what you might call character during the finished product. I like it, although it's not exactly wildly innovative.