Trevor De Brauw of Pelican Uptown

Chicago-based guitarist Trevor Shelley de Brauw (Pelican, RLYR) has announced the release of his first solo album — a collection of power-ambient compositions entitled Uptown. The album is a stream of consciousness sustained for too long, an aural pendulum swinging between poles of murky distress and cathartic resolve that take shape somewhere in the hazy valleys between rock, ambient and experimental music.

Trevor de Brauw’s twenty-year musical career has manifested as an exploration of the vast possibilities of the guitar. This release departs from the riff-oriented songwriting of Pelican, taking a plaintive approach that unravels the meditative depth of washed-out riffs, deconstructed drones, and carefully controlled feedback. The album delves into complex dimensions of deeply layered textures: an evocation of haunting melodicism that shares more common ground with Brian Eno’s ambient work and drone wizards Barn Owl than it does a metal record.