Jules Reidy - Clerestory (2026)

Very different from last year's relatively poppy 'Ghost/Spirit', Jules Reidy's second Thrill Jockey disc is a heady consideration of humanity's core relational dynamics that balances a sidelong string quartet commission with a sequence of disorienting reworks, using the rare RMI synthesizer and 12-string guitar.

'Ghost/Spirit' might have been the album we were expecting from Reidy ever since we heard their incredible 'World in World' album back in 2022, but they've never been content to stay in a single lane. 'Clerestory' follows the more contemplative direction of 2023's 'Trances' and the excellent 'Neutral Star', a collaboration with improv troupe The Pitch, using our anticipation of a poppier expression as a diversion tactic. It begins with the almost 20-minute 'Shadow Symmetric', a string composition Reidy wrote for US-based ensemble JACK Quartet, whose obsession with just intonation is right in line with Reidy's own. And it's a tough piece to accurately describe without getting tied into knots with theory; to put it plainly, it uses two different xenharmonic scales at the same time, so the close (but not close enough) intervals create unsettling dissonances and unexpected resonances. The clue's in the title: it's about symmetry, or at least how a reflection can differ when it's closely examined. Reidy's themes are laid out in even more intricate patterns on the flip, when they re-interpret the same material using completely different instrumentation, providing a "distorted mirror image" in their own words.

The most conservative, or at least most readable, version is the first, when Reidy approximates the JACK Quartet's performance using MIDI strings and voices, producing a disquieting fanfare that sounds as if it belongs on a lesser-known JRPG soundtrack. And as the side unfurls, Reidy's full range springs to view. On 'Clerestory Windows II', they play 12-string guitar against a gauzy backdrop of granulated strings, displaying how the piece shifts as it's moved to different instruments in vastly different acoustic settings. But we really get a taste of the project's scope on the brief 'Clerestory Windows IV', a prelude to the album's brilliant finale that's arranged for the RMI Harmonic Synthesizer, an early digital instrument that arrived almost a decade before the Yamaha DX7 and shares its glassy, hyperreal qualities. Reidy joins in on guitar on 'Clerestory Windows V', mimicking the uncanny arpeggios and playing rapid, twanging sequences against hazed sine tones. Seriously mind-bending, it's the kind of music that does and doesn't sweat the small stuff; Reidy's wide-angled view is important - they're making sure we realize that it's the idea behind the music, that's concerned with life's fuzzy boundaries, is more significant than the more nuclear choices.

But at the same time, when you crane your neck in further, everything's been considered and every consideration makes perfect sense. Genius stuff, really - whether you're into Philip Glass, Arnold Dreyblatt or John Fahey, it's required listening.