Young People Issue #27

All At Once (Too Pure)

By Kristina Francisco
Published: March 1st, 2006 | 12:00am

Katie Eastburn and Jarret Silberman, the duo who now make up Young People after co-founder Jeff Rosenberg left in 2004, deliver a powerfully haunting and dramatic record with their third full-length, All At Once.

From the onset, the solitary and desolate mood of All At Once is at the fore. Eastburn’s torch-singer vocals are front and center, soaring over the beginning piano lines of album opener “R and R” ’til the end of closer “Ride On.” Her voice carries most of the tracks of the record and beautifully fills the spaces left by the minimal instrumentation of the album. On “Forget,” she pushes Silberman’s percussion forward; On “Your Grave,” she laments death over sparse guitar. For his part, Silberman creates an isolated ambience for Eastburn to build on: “F” is dreamy and rainy and the drama of “Reapers” is shaped by his piano-playing. The only misstep here may be the discordant “On The Farm.”

Everything on All At Once is tight and intentional, the result of the duo living on two different coasts. With Eastburn in New York and Silberman in Los Angeles, the tracks here were culled from demos the two sent back and forth to each other, and perhaps explains the solitary sense of the album. Though All At Once is sparse and short (11 tracks in less than 30 minutes), it’s one of the best records I’ve heard in a while, where every note, beat, and moment is absolutely indispensable.