I think I may have found my least favorite album of 2013. Stranger by Starlight is a collaboration between multi-instrumentalist Anthony Saggers and his hand-picked vocalist, Eugene Robinson of Oxbow. I honestly don't know what to write about this album, except that it is a waste of time. That's about it.

Imagine, if you would, an album that never gets going. Imagine an album that is composed of one seemingly long, drawn-out, pretentious composition after another. Imagine, for a moment, an album that is entirely ambient and has little or no actual music. If you can imagine these things, you will have figured out "Chalk White Nights". 

The "music" on this album is made up of boring, simplistic elements. Sure, there is piano, organ, some horns of some sort, and something that could pass for drums. I think there might be some guitar. However, all of these are used to create an atmosphere of dull, excruciatingly slow-paced, repetitive pieces that seem more at home in an artsy-fartsy club than in the real world of music. There is no melody. There is no harmony. In fact, I think Saggers' fingers got stuck to the organ keys again. All we get are looped sounds and Eugene's "singing". Yeah, I wouldn't call it singing. It's basically bassy, low talking with an annoying pseudo-emotive tone. In other words, there isn't anything of worth in this entire album.

I have to admit that I'm disappointed. The cover art is actually interesting, and the idea sounds good on paper. However, this album fails in every way. The only reason it doesn't get an even lower score is because I feel rather indifferent about it. I don't hate it. I just don't want to remember it exists.