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  Originally released on Life Like in an edition of 30 tapes way back in September 2013, the first evidence of Land & Buildings' particular magic was largely swept up in the bustle of those jumbled times.
  
  At that point, the group was a relatively new and still nebulous collaboration between Kendall Babl and Dominick Smith, two friends who'd met at art school in Chicago before quickly going separate ways. Hibiscus was the result of marathon improv sessions that happened whenever they found themselves in the same area code, with unlikely combinations of haunted, folksy vocals, lone trumpet, synth repetitions and clacky drum machine beats landing the project in an all but uncharted domain. Equal parts isolated mountain music, minimalist composition breezes and Zuckerzeit-era Cluster, these songs sound very much like the seedlings they are. A profound and exciting starting point for a group that slowly developed and refined themselves from here.
  
  At the time of the original release, Life Like was flying pretty fast and loose with releases, putting out hand-dubbed batches of four or five new titles every couple of months and giving most of the tapes away at gigs. As Land & Buildings became more of a solidified project, Hibiscus warranted some revisitation. The editing process that whittled several hours of raw studio tracking down to only the most captivating 30 minutes for public consumption was fairly new for the label in 2013, but would become standard practice on records for Billowing, Utica, Hydropark, and other Life Like jammers trying to consolidate the ever-roaming sounds. Here it manifests as a beautifully randomized collection of defragmented statements, with themes fading away only to repeat a few songs later, mismatched feelings placed side by side until they're forced to get along.
  
  Seven years later, Hibiscus reveals itself as more valuable and enjoyable than the passing daydream it felt like initially. It's a lasting and engaging early statement from a band that continued to evolve, and a must for anyone who missed it the first time or felt the excellence of 2019's Huron River Eclipse. ... more
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