The Ghost Caravan’s Debut Album “Hineni” Conveys an Adventure Through Sound
In the Torah, as Abraham is called upon by God to sacrifice his son, he says “Hineni,” a Hebrew phrase roughly translating to “Here I am.” This phrase is the namesake for The Ghost Caravan’s debut album, Hineni, an epic journey of music that Kyle Benor, frontman and recent graduate of the Berklee College of Music, playfully calls “adventure-folk.” Hineni was released in January of 2021, but some of the lyrics and arrangement date back to as far as Benor’s sophomore year of high school. Benor provides unique insights into how he crafts the atmosphere of his music, and the ways in which he is carving his own place within the indie music world.
Hineni is arranged to bring the listener on an emotional journey through different sights as you cross the landmark which the opening song, “The Bridge at Night,” creates. The band succeeds in creating fully atmospheric and immersive experiences throughout the album. Of the seven songs, many are titled after a location, beginning with the fully instrumental “The Bridge at Night”, driving the listener down the “Endless Road,” and even taking the long expedition to “The Sea + The Sky”.
“When I think of music, I think of location. I think of time of day, season, weather, that sort of thing,” Benor said.
From there, with intense arrangements and orchestrations, the songs grow and develop into their own entities. For example, “The Bridge at Night” has thirty musicians playing to create this triumphant opening. Benor is very adamant about sound and music being the driving force in good songs, not just lyrics. The common advice “show don’t tell” drives his music style as he strives to bring himself and the listener to a common feeling.
“If I get you to the feeling, we are feeling the same thing, and that’s more than the words will ever do,” Benor comments.
This is not to say that his lyrics lack in any way, but in fact that opposite. The lyrics of Hineni are crafted to create vague anecdotes of Benor’s own life in a way that the listener can apply themselves to the music and make the songs deeply personal. Benor comments that once he has created the images in his music, “The songs start talking about themselves sometimes.” While each song is dedicated to an anecdote in Benor’s personal growth, the music allows for the anecdotes to find life of their own within the mind of the listener. These songs reflect the best kind of music, wherein the sound doesn’t drag you around and tell you exactly where to go, but instead envelops you into its world and lets you explore it on your own.
“The Perseids” is one of the last tales to make amends with as you cross the album’s fabricated bridge, and it is the most personal for Benor. As we discussed the event in his life that inspired that song, which includes one of his favorite lines, “Be together for some time, then you’ll depart/ Like meteors briefly illuminating the dark,” I realized the magic in the universality of his music as I had experienced something so strikingly similar to the events detailed in the song. “The Perseids” conveys the overwhelming feeling of joy and sadness in the best moments that you know aren’t going to last, and at a point the words of the song fade away and the happy-sad feeling is produced through the ending minutes of an epic guitar-driven climax.
“I’ll be damned if I can say what that makes people feel with words,” Benor said triumphantly.
Benor has a strong take on the way he shapes his music, and also in the way he creates his place as an artist in the indie music scene. He talks openly about the problematic manifestations of the indie genre and how it’s male-dominated voices breed misogyny, whether those voices are hypermasuline or of the “soft boy” variety. While these bands and artists inspired his sound, he wants to create a space with his music that moves away from these ideals.
“There’s a big problem with ... male dominance in indie music, and consequently misogyny, and not an adequate representation of people of colors’ voices and queer voices and female voices in my sphere”
As you fall into the mystical tracks of Hineni, The Ghost Caravan will guide you on your personalized walk across the bridge, as you share the joys and sorrows of your past journeys. Benor has made himself vulnerable to the listener through these tales of sound, and he invites you to be part of that vulnerability with him. The title Hineni guides the theme of the album.
“To me that was very powerful, that there was an expression to say ‘here is my full presence’. And getting to the other side of that bridge, and having put all of these things into song the way that I have, the only thing I want to say is ‘Here I am’” Benor said.
In listening to Hineni, you can revel in that joy of presence with him.