Begun as a home-spun recording project for singer/songwriter Edward Droste several years ago, Grizzly Bear, evolved into a band whose name spread slowly through the New York musical underground. Along with multi-instrumentalist Christopher Bear, guitarist Daniel Rossen and Christo-pher Taylor (bass/woodwinds/electronics) Droste found musicians willing and able to contribute to his dreamlike compositions. Yellow House improves on any of the minor imperfections of their prior release, Horn of Plenty. The album is coated with thick layers of ethereal and lugubrious vocal harmonies, lyrics reeling from heartache accented by acoustic accompaniment.

Yellow House’s music is fresh and vibrant yet it does reference music from the past. Twenty seconds into the opening cut, "Easier," an upright piano echoes an antiquated parlor of the early twentieth century. A simple and cheerful acoustic guitar interrupts and is followed by woodwinds, banjo and layer upon thick tender layer of vocals. All this evokes a foreign place clouded with mystery and seeping with shadows and light. The acoustic elements of Yellow House also may remind one of Meddle-era Pink Floyd or even late 60s Gordon Lightfoot to an extent. Even some of the melodic phrases or vocals hint at a Syd Barrett-esque quality.

Despite that these songs may share some subtleties with the aforementioned artists, one cannot help but to hear a sheer exuberance of artistic exploration, original aural coloring and composition. Each song on Yellow House creates a musical equivalent of director Bernardo Bertolucci cinematography: each presents a singular scene that is both broad and narrow in its approach yet captivating and arousing of the senses. The cherubic sway of "Lullabye" careens into discordant minor chord strums that arrive like a death knell while woodwinds chirp in the background, cavernous and haunted. A four-note guitar figure cuts through all of this, a beacon of light through fog, a segue-way to a new theme, a new scene.

Songs such as "Knife" are lyrically short and carry a simple message but are executed with the emotional weight conveyed in part by Grizzly Bear’s thick Phil-Spector-like sound. They sing, "I want you to know, when I look in your eyes, with every blow, comes another lie" with a sheen and delight of a 60’s pop melody but with the cunning sting of a contemporary. Vocals howl and bounce off of one another in the background, low tones and psychedelic falsetto’s flourish like some deranged Brian Wilson in an empty mental institution dungeon. The song ends with a minute long coda that helps transform this song from a ditty to a masterpiece.

Yellow House meanders a bit, but is a consistent piece of masterful art. The record has a dense orchestrated sound where each song transitions flawlessly from chorus to verse, etcetera, offering a seamless flow. Tension and drama build and dissipate like the ebb and flow of ocean waves. Edward Droste and company have the knack for creating evocative soundscapes that provide an ornate tapestry unto where their lyrics rest elegantly. Grizzly Bear is a band to cherish and hopefully one that will continue to evolve and make stellar records such as Yellow House.