Big Warm Ghost, the debut album from young Portland folk-rock band Elk, features 16 songs and as many instruments. Jakob Maier and George Brockett, both multi-instrumentalists, switch off playing guitar and the ukulele, also bringing in tubas, trumpets, pianos, and accordion, among others. The dual rhythmic pulse of Matt Johnson and Ian Francis add flavor with hits of the tambourine, shakers, and snares.
The sound is genuine and true - mixed and edited by Maier, it stays to true to the original dream of the band: true, heartfelt folk-rock that traverses boundaries with soaring ukulele solos and homely campfire ballads. From heartache to snowstorms to the nature of dreams, sweet tenor vocals keep the recordings sounding like real music, the kind that could both be blasted from your car windows and kept as a little secret to curl up to on a rainy day. Recorded in basements, bathrooms, bedrooms, and boulevards, the genuineness of the music is presented with the chirping of birds and crickets and the rumbles of c