Manchester Orchestra - The Valley of Vision

There's a feeling on Manchester Orchestra's 2023 EP, The Valley of Vision, that the band has been through some tough times and need to sit with their feelings for a while. It's a cathartic, deeply ruminative vibe that lead singer/songwriter Andy Hull and the Atlanta band have been cultivating since at least 2014's Cope. However, where that album crackled with grayscale emo electric guitar riffage, each subsequent album, from 2017's A Black Mile to the Surface to 2021's The Million Masks of God, has grown increasingly atmospheric, textural, and internalized. Hull and guitarist Robert McDowell brought a similarly subdued palette to their instrumental soundtrack to 2016's indie film Swiss Army Man, layering keyboards, guitars, and wordless vocal harmonies with a painterly precision. The Valley of Vision completes this transition, as they craft six deeply felt songs that feel like they are working through the five stages of grief. These are contemplative anthems in which Hull frames his di