Each airy track on ambient pop band Husky Rescue’s Ship of Light paints a picture both ethereal and melancholy. The Finnish act delicately strings together the album with unpredictable synthetic sounds, and the vivid imagery created in each track adds up to one visionary tale.
Lead singer Reeta-Leena Korhola’s vocals, somewhat of a Goldfrapp and Lykke Li hybrid, are lightweight and eerie at times, offer haunting lullabies that make for an enchanting siren song. Although Korhola’s entrancing sound certainly enhances the ambient instrumentals, Husky Rescue’s charm does not exist merely in the vocals.
Ship of Light begins with a purely instrumental and captivating track (“First Call”). The album continues with a love song (“Sound of Love”) that pays homage to the “sweet sound of silence” in its lyrics. “Fast Lane” mixes light melodies with the occasional hard-rock guitar lick.
The instrumental first half of “Wolf Trap Motel” sets the gloomy tone until Korhola begins crooning, “I welcome you to Wolf Trap Motel/So this will be your home and shelter.”
In “Man of Stone,” the fifth and most haunting track on Ship of Light, Husky Rescue layer eerie synth sounds over light vocals, which prove to be just as mysterious as the song. Korhola airily sings, “Children come to ask/Why do I wear a mask.”
Husky Rescue also introduces mysterious lyrics on “When Time Was On Their Side,” where the singer repeatedly whispers, “Are you on our side or are you on their side?”
The band incorporates amped-up nature sounds in “Grey Pastures, Still Waters,” offering the listener more vivid imagery. Husky Rescue creates a kind of muted fight song in the following track, “We Shall Burn Bright.”
The last two tracks (“They Are Coming” and “Beautiful My Monster”) represent the end of the tale. Husky Rescue introduces “They Are Coming” with only whistling and drums. “Beautiful My Monster” is a lullaby (“Now you’re waking/Now I’m sleeping”) and a perfect final chapter to the album’s story, a tale of mysterious and fascinating dreams.
