Parallelograms cover

Parallelograms

Linda Perhacs

Released

1970

A lost psych-folk masterpiece that actually lives up to its legend — that’s a rare beast. Parallelograms, however, does it effortlessly, perhaps because the music twines the twain, the effortless and the deeply devotional, on a collection of songs that are melodically rich, with arrangements that never over-egg things. At the album’s core is its astonishing title song, which threads together programmatic lyrics, an ever-entwining guitar motif, and an experimental interlude of woodwind, electronics, and breathy, susurrating voices. If much of the album consists of superior, filigree’d east-coast folk, “Parallelograms” itself transcends genre and idiom.