I have shared Burs’ single before, for example, Try. I was really looking forward to this album, as all singles sounded very promising. Burs are based in Toronto, Canada and I have always had a special interest in Canadian bands.
“The term Holding Patterns is used to point to the ways in which we unconsciously hold our bodies and manifest past traumas as physical symptoms of stress. As relationships unravel throughout the record, so become clear the emotional holding patterns that have exhibited themselves in story/song.” While two voices distinguish themselves from one another across the album, multiple narratives can be followed in the written lyrics – some of love, self-sabotage, delusion and severing ties. The work as a whole strings together one common thread: If not careful, a tightly-held idea of self can attach within the body and contort one’s perception of reality in an endless loop. An eventual letting go – as heard on the penultimate “Hard Love”, and postscript “I Have a Light” – alludes to healing, and marks the closing of a chapter in the music of Burs.”
Beautiful emotional melancholic indie rock. Every track has its own soul, but all work well together. An album deserving your attention from the beginning to the end. So if you have some time, put this in your headphones and just enjoy it. I have the same thing in plans. It’s a pity this was not pressed on cassettes or vinyl records, because they deserve it.
For me one of the best Fall albums of 2022.
You can support the band on Bandcamp.