Complicated Shirt – Compromising Compositions

The wiseacres in Complicated Shirt have disgorged another release for the world to consider. Compromising Compositions, the band’s second full-length, shows that the band hasn’t lost its edge in the couple of years between releases. This one’s a roller coaster, too.

The New York trio takes the approach of cramming as many words as possible into songs that usually feature distorted, note-driven guitar work and rollicking drums. At times, the music side of things bears a resemblance to MX80 Sound, as on tracks like “Procyonine,” “Paper Cups Attached By String,” and “Today’s Front Page.” The playing is loose and sometimes unusual and unexpected, with a free-jazz graft put onto indie rock. While MX80 Sound purposefully went for a deadpan effect, though, Complicated Shirt goes for exuberance.

As far as the lyrics, you’d better have your dictionary handy if you want to make sense of them. Well, actually, that will help you only so much. Looking up “micturate” and “unfenestrated” won’t necessarily help you decipher the absurdist intentions of their usages here. Such dada lines as “Lordotic gargoyles stampeding under jaundiced beacons” can’t really mean anything, can they? At times, you’ll feel as though you are undergoing an experiment in neuro-linguistic programming as you try to process the onslaught of syllables. But it’s all in fun, I’m sure; I don’t think the band intends to rewire anyone’s brain just yet.

Compromising Compositions really sounds like a cross between The Embarassment and The STNNNG. It’s a marriage of some clever wordplay, clever composition, and clever playing. It rocks when it wants to but sometimes it just wants to take it easy and confuse you slowly. “The Somnambulateur,” to take one instance, will drive you crazy if you try to figure it out as its tale of sleepwalking starts involving the kissing of cousins and the playing of Uno. So my advice is this: don’t try to figure it out. Just listen and enjoy. These smart alecks are probably a step ahead of the rest of us anyway.

Mouthus – Follow This House

The members of Mouthus have been very busy lately. The duo’s 2006 album, The Long Salt, channeled the splattering percussion and warped tape rot of groups like Dead C and Hair Police. Since then the band has been releasing material at an alarming rate. In the last year alone Nate Nelson and Brian Sullivan have had a 3-way split with Double Leopards and Sunroof! called Crippled Rosebud Binding, a split CD-R with Cousins of Reggae, the Sister Vibration LP, and in 2007 For the Great Slave Lakes and now Follow This House. That doesn’t even take into account side projects like Death Unit and Eskimo King. Unlike The Long Salt with its din of impenetrable distortion, Follow This House finds the group at its most minimal and oddly beautiful.

Follow This House shows off a new side of Mouthus, quiet and reserved. Instead of the squalling wall of sound found on recent recordings or even the abrasive acoustics of Slow Globes, the album is held together by twilit strands of ghostly time-collapsed wordless vocals and the pink noise of somewhat melodic repeating guitar figures. “Vacation Eyes” demonstrates all of these qualities wonderfully. Behind the infinite sounding strain of guitar, one can hear those haunting vocals and what could at first be the sound of hooves clip-clopping in the distance. Over the course of the track’s seven minutes, the ambling percussive sounds become more like bells echoing in a harbor than horses. “Cameras” follows suit with more low drone guitar wash and a clanging tone not unlike pre-Bad Moon Rising Sonic Youth. “Lake” and “Half-Thaw” both present slight but no less interesting variations on this theme.

Clocking in at a short 36 minutes, Follow This House is proof of further development in the Mouthus camp. While so many bandwagon hoppers offer up uninteresting versions of similar material from album to album, Brian Sullivan and Nate Nelson have spent the last few years developing a distinct sound. I’m sure this won’t be the last recording we get from them in 2007, and that is both promising and exciting.

House on Ponce de Leon – Revisitation EP

Instrumental music and EPs are both interesting animals. While EPs are so short that I’m often left wanting more (of the good stuff, of course!), instrumental discs are often so monotonous that I want less. So when the debut EP from California instrumental duo House on Ponce de Leon came my way I figured it might just land somewhere in the midst of “more, more!” and “make it stop!” – a place that is often a good thing for this fickle music critic.

House on Ponce de Leon is Jeremy Stout (also of Company of Heroes) and Greg Harty. The twosome use a variety of instruments on the Revisitation EP – including guitar, piano, organ, vibraphone, strings, and all sorts of sound effects – to create an extremely cinematic soundscape full of precise rhythms and finely crafted textures. Stout and Harty’s music seems much more technical than overtly experimental, but the duo has an excellent organic vibe that many instrumental-only albums seem to lack.

The first piece on Revisitation is the slow building, sweet-as-spring-rain title track. House on Ponce de Leon take the listener on a meandering stroll that is a fine prelude to “Movement I”, which features some beautiful strings and piano sure to conjure up all sorts of imagery in your head. I’m envisioning lush fields and forests just before dusk, but I imagine each person who listens to House on Ponce de Leon will experience something a bit different. “Movement II” takes the EP on a more somber downturn before releasing the epic “Altogether Remarkable.” This final track is easily the most expansive, with measured style shifts that flow from one surface to another with ease.

House on Ponce de Leon will likely appeal to those generally interested in cinematic, instrumental music. The ambiance of Revisitation is wholly relaxed…soft, billowy rhythms caress throughout. This duo definitely doesn’t hit the usual monotony of an instrumental album, but I’m not sure that my level of interest in this type of music would have me seeking out a full-length release. While it isn’t entirely clear whether House on Ponce de Leon is intended as a main project of Stout and Harty or just a fun, escape-type side project; this debut will hopefully not be the last EP.

A Luna Red – The Death Birds

So, I met my good friend Jack Joseph Duckworth from this band. Well, I actually met him through his girlfriend at the time, Sarah, who ran this rad site called screamo.org back in the late nineties. I think it was 2000 or 2001 and I was booking a tour for one of my friend’s bands. I talked to her for some booking contacts and we just started talking after that. She hyped up her boyfriend’s band, A Luna Red. I eventually started talking to Jack a little bit after that, saw him at some show in Long Beach, reviewed two of his records, interviewed him three or four times…and I don’t know if I should admit this, but am putting out the anthology for A Luna Red sometime in the near future.

Anyway, this is by far my favorite song off of my favorite A Luna Red album, The Death Birds. Extremely cold, yet catchy and surprisingly dancy, this was my favorite era for A Luna Red, although SLMZK was pretty fucking killer too. Anyway, if you like Xmal Deutschland or even know who the fuck they are (shame on you if you don’t) then you will love this band. If you don’t, then I feel really bad for you.

Panther – Secret Lawns

Who would have thought a lowly rock crit like myself would have something in common with Charlie Salas-Humara. Turns out we’re both Panthers. You see, as a graduate of a suburban high school with a heroin problem lo those many years ago I was a panther. Well, in the sense that it was our school mascot. But Salas-Humara is Panther. Where one of us was a panther trying to escape it’s confines, the other sounds as though there is a beast within trying to escape. What does this have to do with Secret Lawns, the full length debut form the Portland, Oregon? Not much really but when you run into something this unique you gotta run with what you can.

Panther creates some of the most messed up music to stick in your head. Over layers of dance rock beats and synthesizers Salas-Humara screams and howls like a caged animal. Take the opening song, “Use Your Mouth Your Breath To Breath” where the first sound you hear out of his mouth is a low moan as if he truly is possessed by some foreign demon. From that we’re off into his trademark falsetto that will work with him as an instrument as much as any drum machine.

Few artists can use their unique voice as a primary instrument. Much in the way that Clapton or Santana use their abilities on guitar (though usually for the forces of evil) Panther uses that falsetto to propel the songs into other realms. Comparisons to Prince are rightfully in order but where Panther actually uses this talent better is in the use of the word “motherfucker.” When you have such a “gift” it just begs you to use it to pronounce it in as many ways possible. Usually preceded by an “ow!” Think Ian Sevonious as another great motherfucker-er. Panther doesn’t over-use this ability as much as one could which keeps it all in check.

With that in mind there are also plenty of tricks used to keep Secret Lawns from getting old. The chorus of “How Does It Feel?” combines the synths and vocals to great effect, causing you to think the 80s did have a few bright moments. The range of influences are all over the map. One song utilizes an old school drum machine where another employs a stuttering vocal line reminiscent of something of off Faust IV. Beats are broken up and thrown against each other, staggering to compete much like what Autechre does. The fact Panther takes such difficult ideas and puts them into a danceable, funky, catchy mess is pretty remarkable.

Ultimately you could call what Salas-Humara does many different names. Dance punk is what the kids are all about these days and sharing a stage with !!! wouldn’t be unfathomable. Nor would it be odd to think of him performing along side The Gossip, which he’s done, or any number of artists on KRS. With such a mish-mash of sounds it could be called electro soul, electro punk, or really just plain fucked up. But if it’s the last one, Panther would be the first to tell you. And you’d be more than willing to believe him.

Rivulets – You Are My Home

Being the third full-length album by solo artist Nathan Amundson as the Rivulets, this debut on Important Records is a strong showing. Where the recording on the two previous albums had a rougher feel, You Are My Home sounds a bit more clean and polished. But, not too polished as to take away the rawness that give the Rivulets a bit of character.

As minimalist tunes from a singer/songwriter goes, this is certainly some of the better music out there today. Following bands like Low and Red House Painters, Amundson has a talent for creating songs that only use what is necessary to create specific moods and nothing more. With the core focusing on Amundson’s shaky voice and his rough acoustic guitar, there are many different sounds added to the mix from a full cast. The additions of cello, viola and piano help to add some depth to the album. Without these additional distractions, I’m afraid the album would quickly become incredibly dull. There are several occasions where the guitar chords and double-tracked vocals sound awfully similar to other parts of the album. This can be dodged when there is differing accompaniment, but without it the songs would fall flat. This isn’t to say Amundson isn’t talented on his own but rather just not diverse enough.

Another thing this album has over his previous album, Debridement is the focus more on heartbreak rather than depression and being wounded. This time around it’s more a feeling of sadness and then picking oneself up and moving on. Although, it’s often difficult to tell exactly what the words in the story are since they can be hard to understand at times. However, in songs like “Motioning” it’s easy to understand with lines like “Come back to me” that he is hoping to restore a love he once had. The brief piano towards the end provides a hint of optimism and this track shows the listener an immediate connection to what he is trying to say. Most of the time the songs feel deeply personal but in a way that is more up for interpretation.

There are many jewels on this album like the slow-burning title track, the starkly pinching “Win Or Lose” and the brewing storm of “Can’t I Wonder”. Even among the beautifully executed lyrics and perfectly placed instruments there are a few areas where Amundson has tried to insert some noise filler – like some unnecessary bits in the title track and in “You Are My Home” that can become an annoyance. But, this is really my only complaint with this album.

At different points throughout the album Amundson’s voice sounds like a more haunting Sufjan Stevens, but not all the time. His voice often shakes a little as if he is emotions are coming out through his lines. With songs like “Heartless” and the lines “How could you say that? You must be heartless to say that” accompanied by only an acoustic guitar and a viola, the mood here is torn – as if you could easily see the situation unfolding before your very eyes. Amundson is an artist that truly understands the principals of minimalism and how to use it to create just the right mood.

Hammock – Raising Your Voice…Trying to Stop an Echo

It’s been much warmer lately than in recent weeks. This has caused an abrupt stop to my “winter” listening; that is, the amount of resolved, slower-moving, intricate compositions has been on the wane with more animated, richer tunes regaining prominence. I’ll admit that my seasonal listening preferences are often dictated by distinctions rather arbitrary, but, regardless, this sudden shift to a warmer climate has had some of my internal devices askew.

One of my choice albums of the last season was Hammock’s latest work, Raising Your Voice…Trying to Stop an Echo. For some reason, though the temperature has changed, it fits comfortably into these new conditions, releasing a joyous luminosity sought typically in the sky. Hammock bridge this gap by managing to craft delicate, deliberate, ambient shoegaze-ish music that still shines with a silhouetted effervescence and undeniable vibrancy, like a glacier slowly and elegantly traversing the surface of the sun.

Taken through a passive listen, Raising Your Voice… fails. Its ethereal washes and placid guitars quickly fall into homogeneity and the occurrence is dismal. However, the album’s gentle and, at times, cautious nature demands intimacy, imploring a listener to approach its sonic fibers as a grand tapestry to be adorned in solitude. Once observed in seclusion, you begin to pick up on the subtle movement that occurs over the course of the pieces, flowing competently and effortlessly into one another while creating an immersive and dream-like experience.

Raising Your Voice… is as frail as a trail of smoke, but it has a certain consistency and an unfettered ardor that maintains its structural integrity even at the hands of the harshest winds.

Cercueil – S/T EP

This self-titled EP contains five tracks of copacetic, synth-based electro-pop from Cercueil, the French duo of Penelope Michel and Nico Devos. Strains of goth and industrial rhythms intertwined with electronic sound effects permeate through the synth-rock foundation as Cercueil blur the boundaries between dark electronic soundscapes and dreamy synth-pop, albeit not quite as polished and with a little less panache than the RIYLs.

But where the music may suffer from an occasional lack of inventiveness the vocals provide compensation and are what supplies Cercueil with some flair. Sounding like a cross between Mimi Goese (Mimi, Hugo Largo) and P.J. Harvey, the vocals glide over the ambulatory electronic textures in a keen style providing the necessary euphonious melodies with often chilling effect.

The singing grabs most of the attention not with catchy choruses or studio trickery, but with torch-song diva bravado. And while the progressive sonic textures simmering below the synth-pop rhythms appear to be somewhat rigid, they are actually a bit fluid, providing a slowly-shifting backdrop for the vocal melodies. These transformations evolve slowly within each track but vary enough between tracks to keep the listener’s attention.

The deep bass and electric beats of the sultry opener “Low” seem like they were taken from a Nine Inch Nails tune and watered down a bit, while the following track, “Opening Night” employs an almost reggae beat sunshiny enough to allow the vocals to blossom. “Noche” and “Sponger Gene” follow at a slower pace with creepier electronic blips and bleeps with some more melodic keyboard bits added to the latter. The EP closes with “U Need It” which was created for Cerberus Shoal’s Earbeat Project #1 and is shorter, sparser and the least tuneful.

While the music on this self-titled EP is interesting enough with intervals of pointed synth-rock and enticing vocals, many of the synthetic beats and trippy melodies are forgotten once the disc has finished playing. But the band seem headed in the right direction and with a little more experience and some sharper songwriting even better things can be expected of Cercueil’s next release. In the meantime, if you like disquieting, dark electro-pop with distinctive female vocals, this 21 minute, 5-song EP is worth checking out.

JJ Wax – Soft Riot (demo)

Honestly, I knew this was coming. Jack Joseph Duckworth has always immersed himself in electronic music, but over the last few years it has kind of consumed him. Well, at least his art. This is me talking for Jack, but I think it is just the freedom of exploration instead of the tight confines of guitar rock – which he sometimes will still do – such as the new Winning LP on which he slung a mean axe.

This song is still in the works and I am sure will sound quite different by time it is finished as Jack is a little bit of a perfectionist. I really dig it though…Eno meets Nitzer Ebb. It has somewhat glitchy beats with some great keyboard lines heavily layered on with Jack’s vocals just kind of floating on top. His voice has gotten a lot stronger since I very first met him, but I kind of miss the old days when he would thrash on the floor and sound like Sonny Kay.

The Mitchells – Slow Gears

Let’s pretend for a moment that the Mitchells really are a family. Staunchly middle class, with twin sons of 14 years, Mark and Bethany have lived in Northampton, Massachusetts since 1987, when Mark moved to the town to pursue a career in hardware sales. He started out on the floor at Home Depot, specializing in lumber and PVC, before moving to a managerial position at Ace and, in 2000, opening his own shop, Mitchell and Sons. Mark soon became one a highly successful local businessmen, earning the loyalty of Northampton patrons with his easygoing manner and periodic 75% off sales; it is widely believed that his store drove Scotty’s out of business in the area, and he is considering opening a new branch in nearby Hadley. Bethany has lived in Northampton for as long as she can remember, though she was born in Concord. She currently helps in the shop and takes the kids to and from school every day. Twin boys Matt and Martin are among the most popular at the local middle school, where both sit the bench for the basketball team. Matt is the more gifted athlete, while Martin shows talent in chess and at the piano. Their Sunday school teacher is quite certain that a bright future awaits them both.

That, at least, is how I see it. Here, in fact, is a band from Northampton that has been playing since 1994, practicing, writing, touring, and recording when they’re not doing the work-a-day thing, and I bet they’ve had some damn good times over the years. But Slow Gears, their third album in a dozen years, is as middle-of-the-bell-curve as a red Ford Taurus, and, like the Mitchell family described above, it’s not passionate enough to do anything about it. To end up in the middle of the bell-curve (as opposed to the left), of course, you have to do as much correctly as the guy to your right, and the same is true of this album: there are points when the guitars make things interesting enough to draw your attention, or the Mitchells take advantage of the melody that’s fallen into their laps and develop it as much as it demands. For the most part, however, it’s no more compelling than a small-town newspaper.

Singer Caleb Wetmore tries hard to write lyrics that pull the band out of the rut, but frustration stalks in nevertheless; he sings, on opener “Still Might Happen,” that “It still might happen/ It’s hiding over the next hill…Don’t look for us outside/ We haven’t made it outside yet.” His intonation recalls Minus the Bear, but where that lauded outfit sing about racing yachts and hydroplaning Cadillacs, we have here the stuff of maybes and almosts. Instrumentally, The Mitchells hybridize Spoon and The ’89 Cubs, but they abandon the fundamentalism of the former without undertaking the adventurousness of the latter, effectively penning an homage to urban sprawl. The real problem here, potentially difficult to swallow, is that there are hundreds of bands and albums that do exactly the same thing with exactly the same capacity. I mean, what is there to recommend an album when one can turn around and hear the same thing at a local open mic night? Essentially, this is how the Mitchells strike me: a good local band that can serve as the stay-at-home mom for a local scene. And hopefully that’s what they’re content to do, for unless they can make a legitimate stab at originality, they’ll no more make it “outside” than I’ll win American Idol.

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