Band Of Horses - Cease To Begin (LP)

Back in 2007, on 9 October to be exact, Band of Horses stepped into their second act with Cease to Begin for Sub Pop, and you can hear the hinge creak as they swing from Pacific Northwest haze toward something a little more Southern in spirit. Ben Bridwell had shifted home base to South Carolina and the new songs carry that warmth, all porch light glow and cicada buzz, even as the guitars still shimmer with the reverb that first put them on the map. Phil Ek remained at the controls and his touch keeps everything roomy and clear, so you get the charm of a bar band finding its stride without losing the sparkle that made the debut such a keeper.

Is There a Ghost lights the fuse. It is almost comically spare with words, but the point is the tension, the way a simple bassline, chiming guitars and that skybound harmony ramp up until the whole track feels like it might lift off the turntable. It became a radio staple for a reason, a reminder that a great hook does not need many syllables. If you are new to Band of Horses vinyl, dropping the needle here is a thrill, the kind of opener that makes you pull the sleeve back out to check the tracklist and grin at what is still to come.

No One’s Gonna Love You is the record’s heart tug, sung with a cracked tenderness that Bridwell has made his signature. Plenty of bands have tried this kind of slow dance, but the melody here is unshakeable, a wedding favourite for indie tragics and later covered by CeeLo Green, proof it travelled far beyond the usual circles. Detlef Schrempf is a quiet stunner too, named for the NBA forward yet more like a letter to a friend than a sports in-joke, the arrangement hushed and twilit, pedal steel-like guitar sighing around the vocal. The General Specific flips the mood with piano, handclaps and a bit of honky-tonk swing, a reminder that the group can be unabashedly joyful without tipping into corniness. Elsewhere, Cigarettes, Wedding Bands carries a ragged gallop and a rueful grin, and Ode to LRC rises on a chorus that feels built for end-of-night singalongs.

What ties the set together is how lived-in it sounds. You can picture a small room with amps turned just loud enough, Ryan Monroe leaning into the organ, Creighton Barrett keeping the beat loose but insistent, guitars circling the vocal rather than smothering it. Ek’s production lets plenty of air sit between the parts, so a tambourine hit or a stray harmony feels like a small discovery. The melodies are cleaner than on Everything All the Time, the edges rounded in a way that points to the country-soul streak the band would keep chasing, yet the melancholy still hangs in the rafters. It is the sweet spot for them, and Cease to Begin parks there for 35 crisp minutes.

It landed well with critics and fans at the time, helped by Is There a Ghost punching onto US alternative radio and by the way these songs made sense onstage, where that reverb bloomed into something widescreen. The U-turn some expected after the lineup change never came; instead, Bridwell leaned into what he does best, writing tunes that feel both grand and conversational, like you are eavesdropping on his thoughts while the band frames them in warm light. Even the sequencing feels right, closing with the drowsy grace of Window Blues, the curtain drifting shut on a late summer night.

If you are chasing Cease to Begin vinyl, the Sub Pop pressing is a lovely way to hear how the guitars breathe, and it sits neatly alongside other Band of Horses albums on vinyl for a Saturday spin. I have seen copies come and go in my local Melbourne record store, and they do not linger on the wall for long, so if you spot one, do not overthink it. You can also buy Band of Horses records online without much fuss, and for folks hunting vinyl records Australia wide, this album is one of those reliable recommendations that rewards repeat listens. It is the sound of a band finding a home of sorts, not by settling down, but by realising that their biggest strength is the way those harmonies and chiming chords make ordinary doubts feel luminous. That is a trick worth hanging onto, and Cease to Begin keeps pulling it off, spin after spin.