High Places consists of Mary Pearson and Rob Barber, who combine the songwriterly sensibilities of The 6ths-mode Stephin Merritt with the attitude perfected by Matmos that says along with traditional instruments, anything that can be struck, blown into or otherwise coaxed into noise should be considered a musical instrument, and that the resulting music should be edited, manipulated and otherwise played with for the benefit of our ears and souls. Glory, glory, Hallelujah! This album presents ten tracks of lilting beats and layers of sounds piled loosely like—likemdash;um, like—feathers? Linen? Pastry? What am I, a simile machine? Those beats sometimes sound Carribean, as on the opening track, "The Storm", and sometimes they sound Middle Eastern, as on "Golden". Sometimes they sound like themselves, without cultural comparators. This isn't verse-chorus-verse stuff, but those lilting beats and loose layers are embellished by simple and elegant vocal melodies that float through the middle of the rest of the music. To say this album is pleasant is true, but also sounds like damning it with faint praise, because it's also more than pleasant: intricate, intriguing and some other adjective that might start with "i" (how about informative? Or inscisive? Or illustrative?) should also be applied. Anyway, it's very good.