My body nearly went numb when a local college radio station first made me acutely aware of this gem, and quickly called them to find out who had just elegantly wasted me so wonderfully. Promise delivers in a spacey understated manner, it’s calm and reserved, all played out in the lower ranges, filled with a foreboding sense of sedation, darkness and longing … yet without the heartfelt pain that one would expect to have been implied.The production is masterful and comprehensive, slowly ebbing its way from your speakers, while warmly and gently wrapping around you like a warm atmospheric blanket, almost as if you’re having one of those dreams from which you can not wake yourself. Filled with longing lyrics, though without a sense of desperation, the band seems more than happy to sit quietly in the darkness pouring out these flawless flowering tunes that swirl up and outward, like the blue smoke of a half forgotten cigarette, that begins to make up and redefine the air around you, giving that air nearly physical weight.The pace never quickens on Promise, it simply moves on at a heartbeat level, filling your pockets and shoes with sand, weighing you down with sleepy comfort, and inspiring you to to just sit calmly an experience what’s being played out in your head and on the stereo … all in a nearly hallucinatory fashion.Review by Jenell Kesler