Amen Dunes, Through Donkey Jaw

The songs that make up Through Donkey Jaw (Sacred Bones), Damon McMahon's second full album to bear the name Amen Dunes, sound as though they’re being broadcast from speakers perched atop telephone poles that could be miles away. Every droning note and hypnotic croon drifts at a cloud’s pace over green, bucolic pastures conjured by the mind's eye. But the ears adjust to the perceived distance and reverb soon enough, and by the time the album's atmospheric opener, “Baba Yaga,” sets the tone, the lo-fi qualities of “Lower Mind,” “Swim Up Behind Me,” and "1985” seem comforting. It’s the sound of the Velvet Underground’s “Heroin,” stripped to its bare bones and strung out to cover an entire album. With “Jill,” things start feeling unsettled, and the longer the album goes on, the stranger things become. Whether “Tomorrow Never Knows” is a cover of the Beatles’ song or not isn’t ever made clear, but the similarities are there, although buried in sonic abstraction, making it a hypnotic and pleasing finale.

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Amen Dunes - Christopher by sacredbones

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Amen Dunes, This Will Destroy You, and Mountains play the Earl, tonight (Wed., Feb. 15). $12. 8:30 p.m. 488 Flat Shoals Ave. 404-522-3950.