Lorca

Lorca, along with the harrowing masterpiece Starsailor, is arguably the artistic high-water mark of Tim Buckley’s career. Though Lorca’s meandering and occasionally dissonant compositions sounded little like the gentle folk-rock on which Buckley had built his reputation, the keening experimentation here found Buckley exploring the potential of his four-octave vocal range to intoxicating effect. Over the course of five almost torturously extended numbers Buckley wails like a man possessed, bending and testing the limits of his voice in a manner that recalls the full-bore assault of sax men like Albert Ayler and John Coltrane. The arrangements of songs like “Anonymous Proposition” and “Lorca” are skeletal, jazzy whispers that serve as elegant framing devices for Buckley’s flights of vocal fancy. Lorca is a demanding listen to be sure, but few artists have utilized the human voice as imaginatively and compellingly as Buckley does here.