(This post originally appeared on Tympanogram.com on November 16, 2011)
A Happy Death 7" EP
It’s really great to be a music blogger. I get the chance to listen to a ridiculous amount of music that I would normally not have any clue existed. Sometimes it’s better that way, I mean there’s a lot of crap to sort though, but it’s definitely worth it to find the good stuff. Sometimes, though, the good stuff shows up in my mailbox unsolicited (bands: take note!). I mean my actual, real life, physical mailbox. Portland outfit A Happy Death emailed me and insisted upon sending me their 7″ EP. I’d be stupid to pass up free vinyl. I’m grateful for their generosity and even more grateful that I don’t have to write false praise.
The 4-track self-titled EP is an energetic, reverb soaked garage rock trip. Similar in style to, maybe, The Black Keys in their overdriven guitar sound based squarely in the tradition of blues and surf rock. More direct and tighter than the White Stripes, but in that same realm. Sometimes Ryan Lella’s vocals reminded me a bit of Jack White, but the band seems to be influenced more by older acts like Black Sabbath and The Kinks than anything else.
The garage aesthetic is front and center on “Nazi Zombies” with a dirty riff and vocals echo a bit in the back of the mix. Similar in this vein is “Surf Rock Band,” a track that stomps right on through to the end with a harmonized double guitar solo, each panned hard to either side, that is good and noisy. “Ghost House” picks up the pace a little bit, closing the EP on a strong track. My personal favorite is “Mr. Rutter,” a laid back, minor key ballad with a doo-wop swing and well placed vocal harmonies about a down on his luck transvestite factory worker. The tone of this track isn’t far removed from the rest but the clearer vocals push it a bit more towards the sound of MGMT and their “Congratulations” album that found them exploring the sounds of the early psych rock era mixed with a bit of Motown production. A Happy Death play off of those same vibes of psychedelia that are a little rougher around the edges.
A Happy Death has their sound down. From the guitar work to the reverb soaked vocals to the organ that perpetually toils away in the background adding to the atmosphere. This EP is the real deal and suggested listening for fans of garage and psych rock.
Sometimes it just feels great to have some loud music blasting into your ears. It’s better if the sonic assault isn’t something that is relentless, rather persistent but giving and taking in all the right places. The band has a knack for knowing how to take things back a bit, build up the momentum and charge ahead again at full speed. This album is appropriately titled in that the loudness and sheer power of the guitars only seems to get progressively louder, leaving the listener feeling like they were punched squarely in the gut.
I mean that in the best way possible.
Take opening track “Circles and Squares”. It begins with the guitars creating a loud barrage of sound through to the beginning of the verse, where they back down a bit. But they can’t seem to hold themselves back for very long. Everything returns to full volume save for the voice, which retains its calm in the eye of the storm. In that way the voice creates a point of balance. The entire latter half of the song consists of a steady buildup. The amount of energy that is created seems unbearable for a while, yet continues to accumulate, exploding into the conclusion of the track . Before we are given the chance to catch our breath, the next track, “Medicine”, is already building itself up with maniacally pounded guitars in a thick, clear tone.
We Were Promised Jetpacks - "In the Pit of the Stomach"
The name of the band even manages to capture some of the barely restrained energy of the anger or disbelief at unfulfilled promises. Track after track the album unfolds in a roar. “Through the Dirt and the Gravel” benefits from layers of rhythmic complexity courtesy of the bass shifting the established pulse. Layers of melodic guitar lines weave throughout the bridge while the vocals are recorded to sound a bit more distant and cold. The frantic, tremolando strumming of the guitars form an active backdrop as singer Adam Thompson belts “I have soared higher than eagles…” which is followed by the song really building up a big head of steam. The same distant treatment of the vocals is used to great affect in “Sore Thumb” and “Pear Tree”, where the instruments nearly completely fade out, the voice calls out from an apparent distance, immediately after which the wall of guitars slams into us full throttle.
But, as mentioned before, the band knows exactly when to pull back, which is exactly the purpose that the entire song “Act on Impulse” seems to be fulfilling. Of course it only begins subdued. The entire track reveals itself to be a slow burning constant crescendo building up one element at a time, adding more vocal harmonies, cross rhythms, drums and other various instruments and effects in the background.
This certainly isn’t to say that the entire album is comprised of loud guitars and swirls of cacophonous distortion. Jetpacks has the enviable talent of being able to balance those elements with sweet melodies in the vocals, or sometimes hidden in understated guitar lines. Both of these can be found in “Picture of Health”. They also aren’t afraid to repeat things several times in order to give elements the proper amount of space to grow. If that means having an instrumental introduction that clocks in at over 2 minutes then so be it. We Were Promised Jetpacks aren’t bound by structure and aren’t afraid to break from it.
A great line from “Boy in the Backseat” states “If there’s breath in my lungs, then there’s wars to be won”. That line displays the fight contained in the songs. Strength without aggression, pride and power controlled but not held back.
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/01-Circles-And-Squares.mp3|titles=Circles And Squares]
[audio:http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/07-Sore-Thumb.mp3|titles=Sore Thumb]
As a musician, and as someone that listens to a ridiculous amount of music, sometimes I am listening just for sounds. Sometimes the melodies and whether or not they are catchy take a backseat to the atmosphere that an album creates.
There have been times that I’ve been so wrapped up in a band’s unique sound that it’s a week or two of non-stop listening before I start to really focus on the harmonic structure, song structure, melodies and lyrical content that is contained therein. This was precisely the case when I first heard Shellac. I remained entranced by the sound of the Travis Bean guitars and Steve Albini’s trademark recording technique sound.
Chad VanGaalen is similar in the way that his recordings have quite a distinctive sound. His production on the 2 albums by fellow Calgarians Women is noteworthy for being characteristically and decidedly lo-fi. Diaper Island takes those production values and applies them to songs that, while still existing very much in the experimental realm, are considerably less abrasive and confrontational that those of Women. The Velvet Underground and Sonic Youth influence is pulled back while that of Neil Young and The Beatles is pushed a bit more to the front.
Chad-VanGaalen - "Diaper-Island"
There is still quite a psychedelic feel to the album with noisy squeals of guitar cutting through on “Replace Me” and the swirling hypnotic backdrop of “Blonde Hash” that fights against the jangly guitar line until it’s cut out completely when the reverb drenched chorus kicks in. “Peace on the Rise” also features an interesting, harmonically disjointed line that seems to fight the song’s own gravitational pull.
The tunefulness of the songs and the noisiness of some of the odd sounds that creep in now and again are balanced well. Neither draws focus away from the other. The songs have the ability to sound haunting, catchy, sorrowful, tender and sincere. They can also wander into delicate, quiet territory or become invasive and gritty without being jarring. The combination of these affects create a powerful experience.
I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the closing track “Shave My Pussy” which is, honestly, a really terrific track with a folksy harp line that is plucked out, leading to a truly great chorus. This coupled with, as one can infer by the title, lyrics that are a bit odd to say the least. All in all this is a terrific album and has cemented itself as one of my favorites of the year to date.
The much anticipated album from indie rock “super group” Wild Flag has finally arrived, giving everyone something to shout about. One could practically hear the reviewers proclaiming the, at that point unnamed project, “Best of the Year” after Carrie Brownstein announced that she was leaving her post at NPR. It was decided a priori that this group was going to be amazing. I don’t want to start to sound like I totally disagree with the excitement that is surrounding this group, I just am shuddering slightly at the nepotism of the scene.
Luckily for Wild Flag they have released an album that is capable of supporting all of the buzz that has been generated on its behalf. A backwards approach, but that isn’t their fault. From my point of view it seems as if they are starting from as new a place as they can. They can’t help that they were in Sleater-Kinney, Helium and a bunch of other more under-appreciated bands, and why would they want to? It’s that experience that no doubt influenced the formation of Wild Flag and the production of their solid debut album.
Carrie Brownstein and Janet Weiss, formerly of Sleater-Kinney, are joined by Mary Timony on vocals and guitar and Rebecca Cole on keys to create a powerful guitar driven rock sound that seems to be influenced by the spontaneity of live performance. The album’s 10 tracks capture the rough around the edges sound of an experienced live band. Despite their only having been together as Wild Flag for about a year it is clear that their collective experience is guiding their way. This album definitely does not sound like a debut. It is a focused and confident release.
Wild-Flag - "Wild Flag"
“Glass Tambourine” and “Racehorse” are two of the more experimental and lengthy jams while “Endless Talk” is reminiscent of The Cars with Brownstein’s sharp, clipped vocals matching to a degree those of Ric Ocasek while her guitar work adds a bit of a more abrasive tone over top. “Short Version” gets right to the point, full steam ahead with blistering guitar riffs cutting through the silence.
Throughout the album Timony’s vocals are contrasted sharply by Brownstein’s. Where Timony’s voice has a more natural and relaxed sound Brownstein’s delivery sounds purposefully forceful. Her guitar style matches her vocal delivery in that it seems to cut sharp angles against the rest of the band. It’s the difference between a song like “Electric Band” and “Future Crimes”. An exciting album from one of the most talked about bands of the year. Thankfully the music seems to match the hype, for once.
Wooden Shjips’ drone of ultra fuzzed out guitars aligns them with the trend of retro sounding new-music that seems to have exploded in the past couple of years. They are taking the psychedelic/early hard-rock sound and very much running with it. The band seems to be more than happy to sit on one chord for minutes at a time in the minimalist style, rhythmically chugging through a cloud of distortion a la Queens of the Stone Age. Wooden Shjips actually shows up Queens in their dark heavy sound being that much more darker and heavier.
The vocals, though certainly not the focus of any of the tracks, remain downplayed and monotonous. They definitely do their part to make the songs sound all the more sinister. It’s like the singer is speaking of bad omens, or summoning spirits and the like. When you get down to it, his singing style is downright eerie.
Extended instrumental sections, like in opening track “Black Smoke Rise”, do their best to mimic the wandering, seemingly one-take guitar solos of the first wave of psychedelic music of the late-60s. These sections seem to serve the songs in capturing a certain vibe, and places that as a higher priority than “saying something”. That shouldn’t be taken in the pejorative sense, but in the sense that a guitar solo, or keyboard solo, that is flashy and driven by technique with flourishes of 32nd notes and technical melodic bravado would truly just not work against the backdrop they are laying down. They seem to be sticking to a very strict stylistic theme and mood here and something showy would stick out far too much. They do a great job throughout the album of establishing and maintaining a consistent sound.
Wooden Shjips - "West"
After the mid-tempo minimalism of the first two tracks there is a burst of energy in the form of a catchy vocal melody in an upbeat tune that is (perhaps ironically) titled “Lazy Bones”. This tune, along with the heavy riffage displayed in “Home”, create a nice dynamic across the album. Wooden Shjips remains true to their sound but show that there is always room to move and create something new, and possibly contrary, without abandoning the aesthetic they have been developing.
The album forms and arc with droning tunes “Black Smoke Rise” and “Rising” as bookends. The latter of those tunes is a backwards track that casts a knowing wink to their already “evil” sound. But the more upbeat riff-based tunes happen towards the middle of the record with “Looking Out” creating a connection by being both upbeat and still droning it its persistent rhythm and complete unwillingness to change chords. Meanwhile “Flight” takes a page out of the Tony Iommi book of devilish sounding riffs, replete with a delay ridden keyboard solo straight out of “Inna Gadda Da Vida”. In a way a lot of these songs ride the line right between those two worlds.
With “West” Wooden Shjips creates droning minimalist music in the context of the heavy, psychedelic rock genre. The attention to consistency of sound most certainly pays off in the end.
The Chicago based math-rock outfit with steady lineup changes, Joan of Arc, adds to their already frighteningly prolific repertoire with their latest effort, “Life Like”.
You know that you are in for a serious journey when an album begins with a track that clocks in at over 10 minutes, with the vocals not beginning until 7 minutes in. It’s the combination of math-rock and prog that no doubt inspired decisions such as this one, and helps to shape the sound of the band in general. There is also a touch of old-school emo the likes of Braid and The Dismemberment Plan evident in the treatment of the vocals where the singer’s voice is just as clean and unaffected as the guitars. It crackles with intensity throughout many of the tracks.
That opening track, “I Saw the Messed Binds of my Generation”, lays the groundwork for the entire album with its crystal clear sound, intricate contrapuntal guitar lines and a lock-step rhythm section. It seems to me that it could easily be broken into two tracks where the first 7 minutes or so are an introduction, or prelude. The final 3 minutes are what actually constitute the opening of “Life Like”.
The guitar lines across the album weave through one another much in the same way one would hear on a Dirty Projectors album. It’s that clear and clean disjointed melodic guitar work that seems to jut out in a million directions while still obviously focused on a single goal.
My prog-trained brain tells me that this is a concept album. “Life Like” projects that album-oriented sound where everything seems to be heading in a clear direction; uniform sound throughout, with intense lyrics and similarity of compositional style throughout. It just sounds like it was written to be an album and they just had to divide it up into songs. There are some obvious commonality between the songs. They very much belong together. The only problem with this is that even after several listens I can’t fully make out the concept. Joan of Arc seem to be hiding their lyrical content in a web of complex metaphors and symbolism in the same way that their guitar figuration are branching out in a million exploratory patterns. This really is a complex and deeply emotional, challenging album.
Joan of Arc - "Life Like"
Contrasting the smooth, scrolling guitar work throughout most of the album is the spastic start/stop rhythmic interjections present in “Deep State”. To that end there is also the nearly a cappella “Still Life” with only muted guitar strings doubled with drum stick clicked against the rim of the snare drum. Though this track does slowly gain momentum and density as melody begins to creep in from the shadows and we are presented with a pulsating beat with bass guitar false starts with the 2nd guitar trying a number of different approaches to break the silence. “Life Force” stands out for its use of a shoddily tuned acoustic guitar that hammers out a straight ahead quarter note rhythm. Though these tracks are the most unique on the album they still encapsulate that sound that is put forth at the very opening of the album. They still sound perfectly in place on the album and correctly sequenced.
Every song on “Life Like” seems to chart the same course, but not all are dark and hopeless. “Love Life” and “Like Minded” are bright and joyful sounding tunes, though the latter quickly seems to take a dark turn moving from cheerful to foreboding in short order. The polyrhythmic overlapping of delicately plucked guitar lines creates an interesting texture that is less abrasive than much of the guitar work featured on any other track. The song continually grows darker as the distortion kicks in and the vocals move from shouting to screaming, voice cracks and all.
Concluding the album is “After Life”, with it’s martial drum roll and drill sergeant/platoon call and response. A great lyric from this album closer states that “my discovery: I am all alone” seems to accept the irony of stating such a fact while surrounded or followed by people that shout back at you everything that you say while they march in step behind you. That track bursts unexpectedly into a distorted and frenzied guitar solo. That is not the only instance of spontaneous guitar soloing either, they seem to crop up a lot, it sounds like they are being exorcised out of frustration, or that they otherwise come from some deep, dark place and just need to be there warts and all.
The concept comes across in bits and pieces and, judging by previous work by the band, that is exactly how they like it. They like coming off as mysterious and complicated, confusing and comical. This album is certainly many of those things, all balled up in a tightly wound web of intricate guitar work, complex rhythmic shifts and symbolic lyrics that would confuse and frustrate Cedric Bixler, famous for creating equally convoluted and impossibly shrouded lyrics with At the Drive-In, who would be the hard hitting counterpart to Joan of Arc. By the looks of it though this band has no intentions on stopping.
Figurines is a poppy rock trio based out of Denmark that has been touring fairly relentlessly since their formation. Their latest self-titled release is 11 tracks of tight songwriting, catchy hooks and memorable melodies.
Though their most recent album was released in September 2010, the band has yet to make it to the United States in its support. That is all going to change in June when they play a few dates along the East coast in Boston, Philadelphia, and Brooklyn. That they are touring here in the Summer seems apt as their songs encompass an aura of sunniness with an upbeat attitude.
Each of the songs on “Figurines” remind me a little bit of the catchiness of The Spinto Band, but the opening track, “Hanging From Above” is especially great. The strings soar while the guitar echoes the exuberant vocals in the chorus. It’s sweet, bright, catchy and infectious. That’s a pretty good formula for a good summer hit. Maybe listening to this song in the months leading up to summer can help us all ignore the grey skies and rain for a bit.
Head to Figurines’ Bandcamp to grab “Hanging From Above” on vinyl or digitally.
Halifax natives Sloan are celebrating their 20th year as a band with an album full of hook laden power pop perfection. As usual the album title serves as a double meaning. Double cross meaning 2 xs, the Roman numeral for twenty, or perhaps it’s a reference to something more disquieting? It’s the former, not the latter.
It seems that every time one reads about Sloan it’s the same thing: something along the lines of “4 songwriters with distinctive voices and styles”. That is usually followed by a reference to The Beatles, such as the “Canadian Fab 4” or some such nonsense.
It really is a shame that Sloan is not more popular in the U.S. I feel that their albums are strong, for the most part, and nobody anywhere can write a song as good as these guys. I’m not saying that being popular in the United States would mean that they have finally “made it”. I’m just saying that they deserve a worldwide audience and if the U.S. didn’t have such terrible taste in pop music, and people knew what was good for them, they’d be playing Sloan on radios across the country. If more people had a chance to hear them I don’t doubt for a second that they would have a much larger following.
But alas, they are (at least in the United States) something of a cult band, with the inherent small but loyal following. Sloan manages to produce consistently great material even within less popular albums, such as Pretty Together and Action Pact the one-two punch of mediocrity that their fans love to hate. It seems that those two albums went against their sound that usually remained pretty well in tact from album to album with nothing too jarring happening on sequential releases.
Recently they seem to be back on track in a big way with 3 really solidly fantastic albums. “Never Hear the End of It”, an amazing double album from 2006, “Parallel Play” from 2008, the “Hit and Run EP” of 2009 and now “The Double Cross” continues that trend.
Their output, even going back as far as the landmark album “Twice Removed” from 1994, never seemed to follow current trends. Sloan seems content and determined to consistently chart their own path.
Being that they’ve been around for so long, and because of the 4 distinct songwriting styles, Sloan fans have mostly aligned themselves with one band member or another. Much can be written about the distinct stylistic virtues of each member as a songwriter, though I don’t intend to do go down that road. That’s the easy way out. It seems that nobody is too willing to talk about Sloan in terms of the band, Sloan. Fans will often cry out about apparent inconsistencies within albums stemming from the different approaches and sometimes that seems the way to go. Album efforts don’t always feel like band efforts. Sometimes the style shifts from song to song can be a bit much. Perhaps these complaints can be mostly boiled down to fans missing the “good old days” of Sloan.
In my opinion these “good old days” are typically fans projecting unfair expectations onto the band in order to cease forward momentum of their career in order to preserve their own personal memories of that time in their life when they first discovered the band. Music fans, it seems, want bands to stay the same, but not too much the same, because they’ll typically complain either way. Sloan has continued to grow, and for better or worse, have always done their own thing.
Sloan has been around long enough to have “eras”. The most recent such era I would say starts with “Never Hear the End of It”. I feel that this album marks the beginning of a prolifically great songwriting rebirth that followed two albums in which they seemed to be making a concerted effort to change their sound. Since this rebirth it seems as though they have been trying to strike a balance between working separately and working as a band. “Never Hear the End of It” used the technique of melding songs nearly seamlessly together by painstakingly organizing the tracks by key which helped immensely with the flow of the album. They did this before, on their 1999 album “Between the Bridges” though with “Never Hear the End of It” people had a bit more of a difficult time holding interest through to the end, as it was a rather lengthy double album.
Sloan - "The Double Cross"
That album was put together over an extended period of time, and they documented the process with a series of videos on Youtube that I eagerly anticipated watching each week.
“Parallel Play” was the same return to form but it seems a lot more fragmented. The separation from song to song was far more noticeable, though each of those songs were catchy, well written and impeccably produced. Fans again spoke up about a band that seemed unwilling to work together. Even the name of the album seemed to be admission from the band that they were not really working together, but instead took a “separate but equal” approach, convening later to decide democratically what material would make it to the album.
Following “Parallel Play” was the “Hit & Run” EP. It’s a solid offering that experimented with a digital only release and was the perfect addendum to “Parallel Play”.
As I mentioned before, fans try to lump each songwriter’s works together as if each album is a compilation of 4 separate bands, but this discounts how well the albums actually work as albums. Just as “Never Hear the End of It” goes for long stretches patching the songs together and linking them in ingenious ways, so does “The Double Cross”. In addition Sloan utilizes more inter-band participation. Other band members sharing verses, singing background, etc. Such as Chris singing on the bridge of Andrew’s “She’s Slowing Down Again” which introduces a new texture to the rambling rock and roll sound of the track. Chris also appears on the Jay penned “Beverley Terrace”.
The album has a general warmth to it, with very present bass frequencies. It sounds lush and full even on MP3. It sounds like it was mastered for vinyl; it’s not thin sounding at all, or overproduced and compressed to all hell. Standout track “Green Gardens, Cold Montreal” features a delicately plucked acoustic steel string guitar with a perfectly placed ascending Rhodes line. It’s that sort of AM radio quality song that seems to be their niche lately, and they make it work really well.This is also the case for “Your Daddy Will Do”, which has the added bonus of featuring some doubled vocals by Patrick on the verses.
“It’s Plain to See” brings some upbeat, rockabilly flavor (flavour if you’re Canadian), to the album. The ultra-close, multi-tracked vocals are super clean and precise but I think that if the entire group were singing them that the variety of vocal timbre would have helped to thicken things up a bit. The track “Unkind” features some Thin Lizzy guitar work and slapback retro-echo on the vocals that is quite effective.
The Double Cross serves as a great celebration of 20 years of music by a band that deserves more attention. They really should be playing in large venues around the world as there are so few groups that are able to do what they do as well as they do it. If you’ve never heard Sloan, or haven’t figured out where to begin listening, this album would serve as a good introduction to the group.
And be sure to check out their youtube channel where they have included little interviews about each song on the album: http://www.youtube.com/user/sloanmusic
(I haven’t included any tracks from this album as I’m fairly certain that the band would not be happy with that. I have, however, already pre-ordered the vinyl and would like to highly encourage you to do the same here. You can also preview every track from the album at that link as well, so what are you waiting for? Go!)
Go ahead: admit the first thing that popped into your head when you read the title. Yeah, that’s what I thought, sicko. Well that’s not how this reviewer read it at all. I read it as “My blank is Pink” because I am classy and sophisticated and a terrific liar.
Perhaps the provocative title, or non-provocative title as the case may be, serves as the point of entry for the album. Upon reading the title the listener is probably lead to expect something confrontational, something that challenges and pushes the envelope a bit. This album certainly does all of those things to a certain degree. An apt comparison in sound and approach can be drawn from Sleigh Bells to Colourmusic, though stating it that simply is selling Colourmusic quite short.
Sleigh Bells stormed onto the scene with a recognizable “meters in the red” and completely overblown, overdriven sound that, to me, tries a little too hard to get noticed and can be filed away as “gimmicky”. Colourmusic tones it down a bit while still maintaining a powerful and edgy sound that is more organic, yet still charged up. It comes off sounding a lot more realistic and believable. The band doesn’t have an overbearing synthetic sound. Live drums pound behind shredding, layered buzzsaw guitars.
Those guitars are more likely to churn out riffs that sound like they were ripped straight out of the Black Sabbath playbook, while the vocals tend to sound a bit more ethereal and akin to Animal Collective. Take for example the vocals in the chorus of “We Shall Wish (Use Your Adult Voice)”. There are moments there that conjure the same sound-world from which Animal Collective operates with lush multi-layering and plenty of breathy reverb. Colourmusic’s songs go beyond exploring one particular sound. The songs have instrumental appeal in addition to those explorations, meaning that they sound like a band playing instruments, rather than creating music that relies heavily upon the manipulation of other sounds. Instead, Colourmusic seems to be interested in having the listener focus on the layers of sound that one instrument or even one note can produce.
Colourmusic - "My___ is Pink"
The opening of “You For Leaving” states simply the staccato attack of one chord on a piano that is sustained, allowing the listener to hear all of the overtones intermingling and growing into a mass of sound right before the song opens up to a full chorus and pipe organ. It’s an approach that is akin to the work of spectral analysts that compose music where every idea for a composition is literally derived from information that is found in one small fragment of a sound. Colourmusic is adept at extrapolating ideas from sounds but their scientific attention to detail doesn’t diminish their ability to write a dancey, fun song like “Dolphins & Unicorns”.
That song, like “The Little Death (In Five Parts)”, moves between opposing textures starting with a danceable rhythm and moving to more ambient territory. The beginning of “The Little Death (In Five Parts)” though is more like a false start that anticipates a pummeling, raunchy guitar line that is thick and densely distorted, covering plenty of rhythmic ground before the vocals actually begin in a cloud of arrhythmic echoes. The track continues to spend 6 minutes tearing through material that moves from driving guitar work, into a slow dirge of fuzzed out metal before decaying into spacious minimalist territory.
Serving as a counter to all the abrasive guitars are the passionate vocals that appear on tracks like “Feels Good to Wear” and “We Shall Wish” where a sense of longing and pain can be gleaned. The usual ambient effects of the voice in the latter track are placed on the instruments temporarily which is a welcome flipping of the texture. The instrumental breaks cast that song into an arena rock light where the track just opens up , pushing and pulling against the wall of sound that is barely contained by the band.
The band is agile enough to handle jumping between styles and textures even within the same song. They can move from loud and powerful to quiet, spacious and delicate and make it make sense. The construction of their songs is tight enough and logicalto the point where these changes don’t seem jarring.
Rounding out the end of the album is the track “Whitby Harbour”, which is simply the sound of waves lapping up on the shore. Perhaps this serves as a point of respite from a fairly intense album, or perhaps this is moving more in the direction of finding the music within sounds. A bit of spectral analysis of nature.
This album, “My ____ is Pink”, is nearly unclassifiable. It sounds loud and psychedelic in spots, but direct and danceable in most others. Somewhere between electronic and rock with songs that have intricately crafted dynamic shapes and tight, well thought out structures.
Finally, after all the hype of indie culture coming to the mainstream, with Arcade Fire winning the Album of the Year Grammy and every band everywhere looking for a unique sound, we get an album that gives us exactly what we need. Yuck has delivered an album that has garnered a lot of attention for its fresh sound that, ironically, is captured by going back to sounding like the music of the 1990’s.
It is funny to think that we can actually refer to this music accurately by saying that it sounds reminiscent to the songs of late last century. A time when MTV actually played music. When shows like “120 Minutes” would showcase music that was up and coming, college radio fare that was not getting much, if any, mainstream attention. I’m sure I am not the only one that remembers staying up late as a kid to catch a glimpse of all the cool, obscure music that was coming out so that I could slyly reference it later in school when talking to my friends. Man, they would think I was so cool. Not that Yuck’s music embraces obscure acts of a bygone era. On the contrary, it captures the essence of the indie rock scene of the 90s that we all know and love but may have passed by those who were not paying attention. This music is a celebration of a time gone by, though its return is more than welcome.
I read a description online of Yuck as a “rock revival” act. Though I know the point that this particular review was getting at I still find it frustrating that the very people that listen to and love rock music are constantly claiming that it is a dead artform. Take for example every time that The Strokes, or any member of The Strokes, releases an album. The magazine covers seem to always ask, “Can The Strokes save rock?” as if it is a genre that is gone, or at least deteriorated and in need of rescuing. I don’t know if Yuck has the power, or even the willingness to “rescue” rock music but they have crafted a beautiful album that is large in scope and certainly charming in its reminiscence of music that music fans of my generation grew up listening to.
Yuck - "Yuck"
Strands of early Sloan, early Smashing Pumpkins, Thrush Hermit, Hum, Sebadoh, The Burdocks and Dinosaur Jr. (in the album’s noisier moments) shine through track after track. The album doesn’t come off sounding like some unearthed relic, nor does it feel or sound old or stale in the slightest. Ideas and sound taken from the 90s are developed a bit with tighter rhythm section behind the initial wall of shoegazey noise.
I’m sure that there will be plenty of people tossing around the term “post-modern” in reference to Yuck. Sure, if the shoe fits, but those that dismiss this album as a simple throwback are missing the point. This album and this band seem to be reminding a tired, fractured and disenfranchised indie-rock fan base, that is constantly pulled from one direction to the next, of where we have come from. Perhaps this album can serve as a reset point where we can ponder the roots of all that is coming out today. Or, perhaps this album can serve as a direct line connecteing the music of today to the music of twenty years ago as an alternate reality where an overabundance of easily reproducable, easily attainable music never came to be and therefore never forced fans to choose one of a mulitude of made up genres to which they pledge their unflagging allegiance. Imagine good music stripped of hipster culture. This, I believe, is the world in which Yuck longs to exist.
The album is an “album”. By that I mean that it is a complete journey from beginning to end. Noisy rockers such as album opener “Get Away”, “The Wall” and “Holing Out” are broken up by quieter, more contemplative material such as “Stutter”, “Suicide Policeman” and “Rose Gives a Lilly”. All the songs feature prominently catchy hooks and layered guitar work. “Shook Down”, with its duetting boy/girl vocal, is especially effective as is the up-tempo distored folkiness of “Georgia”.
It seemed to come at us out of nowhere but now we are 20 years past the Seattle “grunge” explosion and just as far are we from the surge of great music that came out of the Halifax scene around the same time. It seems that this is just about the perfect time for a band like Yuck to bring us right back to the comfort of our indie-rock roots.
Soundgarden has reformed, Sebadoh and Dinosaur Jr. have been playing shows, and Beavis and Butthead is returning to television. It seems that a full on 90s reboot is taking shape. It’s a good thing that a band like Yuck can make something new amidst all this looking back.
![A Happy Death 7" EP](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/272048789-1.jpg "A Happy Death 7" EP")
![We Were Promised Jetpacks - "In the Pit of the Stomach"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/jetpacks.jpg "We Were Promised Jetpacks - "In the Pit of the Stomach"")
![Chad-VanGaalen - "Diaper-Island"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Chad-VanGaalen-Diaper-Island-300x300.jpg "Chad-VanGaalen - "Diaper-Island"")
![Wild-Flag - "Wild Flag"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Wild-Flag-300x300.jpg "Wild-Flag - "Wild Flag"")
![Wooden Shjips - "West"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/West-300x273.jpg "Wooden Shjips - "West"")
![Joan of Arc - "Life Like"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/joan_1.jpg "Joan of Arc - "Life Like"")
![Sloan - "The Double Cross"](http://quartertonality.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/sloan2.jpg "Sloan - "The Double Cross"")
