Former Audrye Sessions frontman Ryan Karazija’s solo debut album is one that could easily be described in glittering generalities: “beautiful,” “stunning,” and “marvelous” are all words that fit, but feel glib in praise. Those words simply don’t cover what Low Roar accomplished. Instead of working over the tired singer-songwriter material that focuses more on personality than craftsmanship, Low Roar takes a marvelous approach to building songs around mellow vocals and brilliantly played acoustic backing, with “Rolling Over” being a perfect track. “Patience” takes the album to its musical extreme, with mournful vocals and perfect arrangement. The whole album takes heavy vocal cues from Nick Drake and arrangement cues from Sigur Ros, which gives the album an incredibly deep feel to it. This is as perfect of a debut singer-songwriter album as you will ever hear.

(Tonequake Records, c/o McDonough Management468 Pennsfield Place, Suite 202, Thousand Oaks, CA 91360)