12. The Moon Rang Like A Bell / Hundred Waters

The Moon Rang Like A Bell is spellbinding.  Nicole Miglis's vocals are vulnerable and strong.  She moves from whispers to emphatic statements, her searching pleas heartrending and always pretty. At times disembodied and desperate, her unusual voice loosely holds the record together, while the band's grasp of organic technology fills the atmosphere with unavoidable apprehension.

Hundred Waters have created a sophomore record you might expect to come from Iceland or England ala Bjork or Bat for Lashes, however, the four friends recently attended the University of Florida together. The unpredictable movement is one of the best aspects of the record, as the piano chords, percussive explosions, and skittering electronics flow into unexpected swells and silences.  The songs unfurl, build, and then collapse, hanging in the air like moonlit shadows, just out of reach, before they dissipate into the night.

Miglis's voice is seamlessly embedded into the record's fabric, her lyrics almost indiscernible at times, more instrument than message.  She has toured the world as a concert pianist, but listeners are well served by her fronting this imaginative band and its contemporary take on disparate styles drawn from synth-pop, EDM, and folktronica.