David Sheppard first conceived Snow Palms as a vehicle for music played on mallet instruments metallophones, glockenspiels, xylophones, marimbas, etc, devices that have featured intermittently across almost two decadesworth of the multiinstrumentalist's miscellaneous collaborative projects that include State River Widening, Ellis Island Sound, The Wisdom of Harry and PhelanSheppard, among a host of others. Snow Palms' 2012 debut album Intervals won a sheaf of approving notices for its ineffably cinematic blend of polyrhythmic percussion and richly melodic orchestration, partly achieved in collaboration with arrangercomposer Christopher Leary aka Ochre. Two years in the making, the followup builds on the foundations of its predecessor, with a heavy quotient of metallophones, glockenspiels and marimbas at its core, but largely eschews the latter's chamber arrangements in favour of soaring synthscapes and a palette of spectral ambient and electronic textures. Despite that, Origin and Echo is a more performative record than was Intervals, its eleven organic, kinetic pieces meticulously constructed by Sheppard from initial percussive skeletons largely essayed instinctively, in free time, without clicktracks and with almost no guitar. The album is loosely predicated on themes of mirroring and rebounding, whether physical or metaphorical, inspired by everything from the gravitydefying parabolas of space flight to patterns of human migration and feelings of deja vu summoned by nostalgic journeys.