The Antlers Mercury Lounge August 21, 2009 Written and Photographed by Lara Longo Opposite Photo: Peter Silberman

If you were close enough to the stage, you could see the sweat wicking off Peter Silberman and his guitar. "It's a bit chilly up here," quipped The Antlers frontman. The Brooklyn-based band's record release party at Mercury Lounge couldn't have been steamier and yet, the sold out crowd endured the swamp-like conditions to pay their respects to Hospice, the Antlers' knockout first full-length album.

Darby Cicci

One of 2009's best, Hospice is a track-by-track chronology of events leading up to and following a loved one's passing. Concept albums have become a tired convention with their tendency to forceful convey tone and message; suffice it to say, Hospice reimagines the traditional concept album. With ethereal drone and delicate falsetto, Silberman crafts a beautifully mournful narrative, one that embodies the duality of death.

Peter Silberman

The guitar-drum-keyboard three-piece performed Hospice in its entirety, almost exactly in order of the album's track listing. Fittingly, the hushed crowd was still throughout the set, with the exception of "Sylvia," a bleek, mid-tempo mover and "Two," a wordy, twinkling shaker. In his operatic range, Silberman sustained impossibly fragile vocals, like on closer, "Epilogue;" moments earlier was an entirely different scene: cathartic wailing, murky synths, and rocking bodies on "Wake."

Darby Cicci	Michael Lerner

Hospice, as performed live, was the acting out of very real concepts—a diagnosis, a death rattle, a funeral, all come to life through the music. When the show was over, the mood was more reverent and introspective than celebratory. And who could blame us? We just spent an hour in mourning and recovery.