With “Immediate,” Local Indie Act Soft Glades Make a Gentle Introduction to Jacksonville Music Scene

The lead single from the Path To Affirmation full-length album, the song “Immediate” from Soft Glades is a five-minute cloud of dreamy guitar rock.

The band is the brainchild (and possibly one-person show) of Northeast Florida singer-songwriter Eric Dawkins; the band’s brief press release allows that Path To Affirmation and “Immediate” touches on “some universal themes: falling in love, experiencing heartache, losing faith, finding identity, and ultimately making peace with the past.”

From the opening salvo of “Immediate,” those aforementioned introspective principles start to become evident sheerly due to production, and the band’s self-described imprimaturs of “post-rock” or “space rock” are apt: a foundational wash of decay-rich synthesizer and heavily-processed electric guitar serves as the sonic backdrop and de facto constant of “Immediate.” A minimalist, hesitant four-note bass figure draped over an equally basic beat, as electric organ and reverb-drenched guitars rise from the mix. At the bridge, the instruments fade out leaving only the aforementioned electric current, as Dawkins slowly introduces more layers of shimmering, finger-picked guitar lines that thread and weave “Immediate” out into the song’s end and silence.

The lyrics are equally hazy, impressionistic, seemingly pointing to heartache (“the second night I start / to cry” … “can I trust myself / when I know / what’s right”), and, depending on the listener, when combined with Dawkins’ soft and lowercased vocal style, this can sound mysterious or ambiguous to the point of distraction. Gentle without degrading into coyness (or at least the more vulgar nadir of “twee”) “Immediate” is arguably monochromatic or at the very least, the mood Soft Glades creates is certainly consistent.

Path to Affirmation is available on all streaming platforms.

Spotify | Apple Music