Order online or call us 01672 5111 06
Search
Sound Knowledge

Menu

  • Home
  • Forthcoming Releases
  • Genres
    • Rock/Pop/Indie

      Rock/Pop/Indie

      Prog

      Prog

      Metal

      Metal

      Dance/Electronica

      Dance/Electronica

      Hip-hop/Rap/R&B

      Hip-hop/Rap/R&B

      Blues

      Blues

      Country/Americana

      Country/Americana

      Folk

      Folk

      World

      World

      Reggae

      Reggae

      Soul/Funk/Disco

      Soul/Funk/Disco

      Soundtracks

      Soundtracks

      Jazz

      Jazz

      Classical

      Classical

  • RSD
  • Events
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
My Cart: 0 item(s)

It appears that your cart is currently empty

  • Home
  • Collections
  • Staff Picks 2021
  • Cassandra Jenkins - An Overview On Phenomenal Nature

Cassandra Jenkins - An Overview On Phenomenal Nature

Collections: All, Dinked Editions, Folk, Rock/Pop/Indie, Staff Picks 2021

Artist: Cassandra Jenkins

£11.99

Notify me

Enter your email and we will inform you when the goods appear in stock

Description Delivery

Released 19th February.

“Nothing ever really disappears,” Cassandra Jenkins says. “It just changes shape.” Over the past few years, she’s seen relationships altered, travelled three continents, wandered through museums and parks, and recorded free-associative guided tours of her New York haunts. Her observations capture the humanity and nature around her, as well as thought patterns, memories, and attempts to be present while dealing with pain and loss. With a singular voice, Jenkins siphons these ideas into the ambient folk of her new album.

An Overview on Phenomenal Nature honors flux, detail, and moments of intimacy. Jenkins arrived at engineer Josh Kaufman’s studio with ideas rather than full songs — nevertheless, they finished the album in a week. Jenkins’ voice floats amid sensuous chamber pop arrangements and raw-edged drums, ferrying us through impressionistic portraits of friends and strangers. Her lyrics unfold magical worlds, introducing you to a cast of characters like a local fisherman, a psychic at a birthday party, and driving instructor of a spiritual bent.

Jenkins’ last record, 2017’s Play Till You Win, confirmed the veteran artist’s talent. Evident of Jenkins’ experience growing up in a family band in New York City, the album showcased her meticulous songwriting and musicianship, earning her comparisons to George Harrison and Emmylou Harris. Jenkins has since played in the bands of Eleanor Friedberger, Craig Finn, and Lola Kirke, and rehearsed to tour with Purple Mountains last August before the tour’s cancellation. Her new record departs from her previous work in its openness and flexibility, following her peripatetic lifestyle. “The goal is to be more fluid, to be more like the clouds shifting constantly,” she says. The approach allowed Jenkins to express herself like she never has.

On album opener “Michaelangelo,” before the heavy drum beat and fuzz guitars enter, Jenkins sings quietly “I’m a three-legged dog, working with what I’ve got / and part of me will always be looking for what I lost // there’s a fly around my head, waiting for the day I drop dead.” Phenomenal Nature thrives in this dichotomy between ornate sonics and verbal frankness, a calming guided tour to the edge. Later, on “Crosshairs,” amid lush strings, she sings conversationally: “Empty space is my escape / it runs through me like a river / while time spits in my face.”

“Hard Drive,” the third track and album centerpiece, opens with a voice memo Jenkins recorded at The Met Breuer: a guard muses about Mrinalini Mukherjee’s hybrid textile and sculpture works, which were then on display in a retrospective titled Phenomenal Nature. “When we lose our connection to nature, we lose our spirit, our humanity,” she explains. Stuart Bogie's saxophone & Josh Kaufman's glittering guitar make way for Jenkins' spoken word which constellates scenes from her life, gradually building and blossoming as she recreates a meditation guided by a friend who incants, “One, two, three.”

Sounds of footsteps and bird calls run through the album’s glittering conclusion, “The Ramble.” Meditative and bright, it recalls how Jenkins felt while writing and recording her new material: “Everything else is falling apart, so let’s just enjoy this time,” she said. If Phenomenal Nature has a unifying theme, it’s the power of presence, the joy of walking in a world in constant flux and opening oneself to change.

Our shipping costs are calculated by weight at the checkout in line with Royal Mail guidelines and include the cost of both postage and packing. 

UK

CD Standard - £2.00 (typically arrives in 2-4 business days)
CD Signed For - £3.00 (typically arrives in 2-4 business days)
Vinyl Standard - £3.99 (typically arrives in 2-4 business days)
Vinyl Signed For - £4.99 (typically arrives in 2-4 business days)
Medium Parcel - £9.00 (typically arrives in 2-4 business days)
Click and Collect - FREE (collection from the shop, please wait for us to confirm your order is available to collect)

We are currently only accepting orders from the UK, if you'd like to place an order from another territory please email us at sales@sound-knowledge.co.uk and we can come back to you with a shipping quote.

You Might Also Like

Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders & The London Symphony Orchestra - Promises Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders & The London Symphony Orchestra - Promises

Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders & The London S...

Released 26th March 2021. SK Album of the Year 2021. "A sublime meeting of minds between renowned...

Released 26th March 2021. SK Album of the Year 2021. "A sublime meeting of minds between renowned electronic producer Sam Shepherd aka Floating Points, tenor sax titan Pharoah Sanders and the LSO. The result is a deeply textured, spacious work centred around a twinkling keyboard arpeggio with some of Sanders' most restrained and sensitive playing (plus the odd overblown bar of blues thrown in to demonstrate that, even at 81, the old fire hasn't dimmed a jot)." Sam Shepherd (Floating Points): ...

£10.99 – £28.00

Buy
Squid - Bright Green Field Squid - Bright Green Field sale

Squid - Bright Green Field

Released 7th May. SK Debut of the Year 2021 "The first full-length from post-punk quintet Squid, ...

Released 7th May. SK Debut of the Year 2021 "The first full-length from post-punk quintet Squid, which combines rubbery basslines, yelping sprechgesang and Ballardian lyrics with a comic exuberance that sets them apart from others in the genre." Squid are thrilled to announce their debut album , Bright Green Field, already one of 2021’s most highly anticipated albums. Bright Green Field, produced by Dan Carey, will be released 7th May via Warp Records. It's an album of towering scope and ambi...

£7.99 – £28.00

Buy
The Limiñanas/Laurent Garnier - De Pelicula

The Limiñanas/Laurent Garnier - De Pelicula

Released 10th September 2021. SK says: "The garage psych duo and French techno legend team up for...

Released 10th September 2021. SK says: "The garage psych duo and French techno legend team up for the soundtrack to an imagined Spanish road movie. Think Weatherall's work with Primal Scream."

£11.99 – £28.99

Buy
Joan As Police Woman & Tony Allen & Dave Okumu - The Solution Is Restless

Joan As Police Woman & Tony Allen & Dave Okumu ...

Released 5th November 2021. ‘The Solution Is Restless’ was written and recorded by Joan As Police...

Released 5th November 2021. ‘The Solution Is Restless’ was written and recorded by Joan As Police Woman with Dave Okumu of The Invisible and legendary drummer Tony Allen shortly before he sadly passed away. Of the album Joan Wasser says : Damon Albarn introduced me to Afrobeat legend, Tony Allen, at the March 2019 Africa Express event “The Circus” and we hit it off. Tony and I played a version of Nina Simone's "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free" and decided to record together. I aske...

£10.99 – £24.99

Buy

Contact Us

Sound Knowledge

22 Hughenden Yard, Marlborough, SN8 1LT

01672 5111 06 sales@sound-knowledge.co.uk

Newsletter

You have successfully subscribed!

Join our mailing list

policies

  • Privacy Policy
  • Refund Policy
  • Shipping Policy
  • Terms of Service
  • Company No. 05240343