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Music has a way, at its best, of expressing things that can't be said. The nuance of a note, the timbre of a string, the colour or texture of the air that passes from a singer's lips all carry meaning and consolation that we feel rather than understand.
 
This is the solace of music, the promise of fleeting attainment in a world of desire. It's the mystery that keeps us reaching for a favourite album that we know by heart, year after year.
 
The Bottom of the Lake is destined to be one of those albums.
 
Tinpan Orange have been quietly spinning their alluring web of gypsy-infused acoustic longing for five years, since the intoxicating sound of Alex Burkoy's violin woke a brother and sister sharing a tent at the Woodford Folk Festival one New Year's Eve.
 

Emily Lubitz had been dancing her burnished silver voice around her brother Jesse's nylon guitar strings for longer than either of them can say. Their old world cadences and passions stemmed from a family where music was as much about devotion as celebration. Alex's Ukrainian heritage made for a seamless union.

 
Death, Love and Buildings (2007) was an album of rich melodies and graceful atmosphere that had Renee Geyer paying her respects. From small festival stages to world-class jazz clubs, Tinpan Orange became a smouldering secret that gently transformed all in its path.
 
The Bottom of the Lake is the fulfilment of that promise. It was produced by Harry Angus (The Cat Empire, Jackson Jackson), whose extraordinary skills as a multi-instrumentalist and arranger make him the de facto fourth member of a band scaling a peak of self-realisation.
 
"The only people involved in this album were the four of us," says Emily. "Harry was the producer, Jesse was the engineer. We were like little kids in a forest, which was scary and wonderful at the same time. It was totally safe and private and we could do whatever we wanted. It was total freedom."
 
The Bottom of the Lake is a work of elegantly restrained virtuosity, from its unique natural percussion to warm strings layered with acoustic guitars, bowed double bass, mandolin and ukulele.
 
Whistles, harmonium and the occasional gentle chorus of the extended Lubitz family help to weave the kind of spell that you feel like a winter coat.
 
"The Bottom of the Lake is a mystery, to me," says Emily. "Sometimes it feels sad. Sometimes I think it's like this fantastic world full of strange creatures and plants and mermaids. I like that dichotomy."
 
A similar enthralling limbo surrounds the album as a whole, from the classically romantic opener, Romeo Don't Come, to the escapist's fantasy of Chinese Whispers, to the disorienting spiral of dream images in Round and Round, one of two especially haunting songs written and sung by Jesse.
 
There's room for unadorned sweetness in the string-wound love letter, Lovely, and pure dedication to life and colour in Song For Frida Kahlo.
 
But the gentle ache of longing is the heart and soul of Tinpan Orange, whether simply homesick in Another Town, or uncannily nostalgic for a life unseen in Every Single Day.
 
"I think longing is really expansive," says Emily. "I think it's an amazing space to be in. If I can catch that, if I can capture my longing for someone or something, or my desire to run away or go somewhere exotic, it's comforting. Those states of being are what brings you closer to contentment."
 
At the end of any given day, a song of pure, melancholy beauty like Suadades may be as close as any of us ever get. "It's a Portuguese word that means longing for something that you might never find," Emily explains, "but it means more than that."
 
Never mind. When words fail, there's always Tinpan Orange.
 
'Death, Love and Buildings' is available at all good record stores through Vitamin Records Distribution