The first words sung on Bothell duo Cock and Swan’s new full-length Unrecognize are “the ghostly lonely feel.” It’s an appropriate turn of phrase for establishing the record's precipitationist vibe. Unrecognize has an uncanny, understated beauty that recalls certain well-worn clichés, like grey skies or rain-stippled landscapes. Just don’t expect the album to wallow in a mire of mopey piano and maudlin string swells—at times, Cock and Swan’s music is more cosmically akin to The Sea and Cake, if that band were filtered through a prism of, well, ghostly loneliness.

While there’s a huge risk in overestimating the importance of a band’s geographical point-of-origin, I think it’s worth noting that Unrecognize seems to have a palpable “cul-de-sac cool”—a simmering, suburban, Ziploc-full-of-pain-meds paranoia (pillwave?). Cock and Swan started as one of those literal “bedroom projects,” though the band (multi-instrumentalists Johnny Goss and Ola Hungerford) have now relocated their recording operation to a nondescript riverside bunker. Maybe that helps explain the record’s arresting townie tone. I’ll reiterate: haunting, ghostly, and lonely, but not not fun.

Unrecognize exhibits considerable range—it vacillates between bucolic folksiness and urbane electronica without ever compromising its consistently spooky splendor. The record also includes pointed allusions to some of Cock and Swan’s primary influences. “Holding On” opens with a slick, respectfully rendered riff on classic Boards of Canada, and tenders some ethereal backing vox which strongly recall the icy Rumraket band Cacoy. As the album progresses, certain elements begin to take precedent; fastidiously chopped vocals, boom-thwak percussion, and breakbeats all figure largely.

Cock and Swan are often labeled as an ambient act, which is probably misleading. Nowhere on this album will you hear soupy washes of multi-layered, heavily-processed instrumentation. Ixnay, too, on the spare, noncommittal oop-lays (not that I have anything wrong with either of these as chillout tenets—quite the opposite, frankly). It’d be more safe to throw Cock and Swan under the spacious, catch-all “IDM” umbrella. There’s no use in scaring off anyone who equates “ambient music” with “naptime soundtrack.”

Unrecognize wraps on an oblique note, with Hungerford’s eerie “da da da” vocals riding out for lonesome minute before coming to an abrupt halt. I’ll need more time with this record before attempting to decode the ending, but maybe there’s something intentionally subversive going on (the closer’s title, “War Drums,” is a clue, perhaps?).

Unrecognize won’t be out until March 16th, and will be available first in a select run of 300 white vinyl LPs (you can pre-order now). Cock and Swan’s DIY label/music collective Dandelion Gold has the hook-up.