American Football - American Football

American Football – American Football

Polyvinyl, 1999 (2014 Reissue, Marbled Red Vinyl)

Acquired: Half Price Books, Used, 2014

Price: $7.50

 

Man, talk about records I absolutely hated the first time I heard them. For a number of reasons, it was never the right time for American Football. The album popped up on my radar in maybe 2005 or 2006 and I thought it was a huge snore! I think it was the little punk rocker living inside of me, even though by that point I had mostly become a convert to the church of indie rock. There wasn’t enough energy! NOTHING WAS HAPPENING! Whatever. You know what other album I hated the first, second, and third time I tried listening to it? Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. And that’s one of my favorite records of all time. So, if I’ve learned anything, it’s not to trust my taste. Some things should be dismissed outright, but something universally beloved by people who would know usually deserves a second, third, and fourth chance before being written off completely. Because that wouldn’t be fair to anyone.

It took five listens before American Football clicked. I don’t know what happened. One day I dug up the MP3s from an old hard drive and it sounded so, so, so fucking good. In that moment I was obsessed. You know what other great album I hated the first time I heard it? Slint’s Spiderland. And that’s one of my favorite records of all time! But I think that record really broadened my palate in an earth-shattering way. It made me slow down. Caused me to look at the insane genius in things that were brooding, slow-moving, and pensive. When I fell in love with Spiderland, I went on a bender of post rock, math rock, and every other kind of rock associated with that album. And I think that’s why American football makes sense.

Still, though, I can’t understand how you could like the first Death Cab for Cutie record and not think American Football’s eponymous debut was better. There’s just a tremendous amount of craftsmanship here. They operate as an emo band with a math rock band’s heart. One of my favorite tracks, “For Sure,” is one of the quietest songs on an album of quiet songs. A beautiful, cyclical riff that plays with a single forlorn horn and by the time the vocals come in, I feel hypnotized. As complex as these songs are, I almost expect them to be louder. They arrangements are bursting with energy, and yet this is an album perfectly suited for a midnight drive on an empty highway.

Like a highway, there are long stretches where nothing happens and you just stare out the window and look at the beautiful scenery. I’m not saying the instrumental that closes the A-Side—“You Know I Should Be Leaving Soon”—is nothing, but it feels like a pleasant breather. A moment for reflection before the second half of the album ramps the emotions back up. As prolific as Mike Kinsella is, American Football is his only release that is absolutely undeniable. His singer-songwriter act Owen is mighty good, and he’s not afraid to push boundaries with Joan of Arc, it’s just that this album is the best blend of inventive indie rock, great songwriting (“Not to be overly dramatic/ I just think it’s best, because you can’t miss what you forget/ So let’s just pretend everything and anything between you and me was never meant”), and complete tonal dominance. It’s baffling that this is the work of a trio. It feels like this band should have at least six members.

This new reissue from Polyvinyl is deluxe as hell. In addition to being pressed on lovely marbled red vinyl, the packaging includes a ton of mood-matching photography and a large booklet that explains all of the tunings, time signatures, and other technical stuff that makes these songs so compelling. The second disc is packed with live tracks and vocal-less demos, some of which were never released in any shape or form (“But the Regrets are Killing Me,” “The 7’s,” and a slew of untitled tracks). Guitarist Steve Holmes’ illuminating liner notes (From the notes for “For Sure”: “Mike had a bad cold the week we recorded the album and this was the first track we attempted vocals on. Mike’s whispery take on this track was probably in part a nod to Elliott Smith, but mostly based on the fact that he couldn’t sing in his normal voice with the sore throat and congestion) coupled with the meandering demos (I should also just tack on a note that Steve Lamos’ jazzy drumming and trumpet (drumpet?) makes up the backbone of this record and his inventiveness really gets to shine on the demos and live takes) are a fascinating glimpse into the world of this short-lived band. 

"Never Meant"

"For Sure"

Pink Razors - "First Degree" 7"

Pink Razors – “First Degree” 7”

Rorschach Records, 2007

Acquired: Show at Solidarity, New, 2008

Price: $4

This 7” was acquired at the only show I ever went to at Solidarity, Lawrence’s anarchist bookshop. I make it sound like every town has an anarchist bookshop. Maybe that’s when you know you’ve made it as a town. When the crusty, anarcho-punk kids open up a lending library of subversive materials and subsequently use the location as a squat. I kid, I don’t know if the anarcho kids who ran the place used it as a squat. I don’t even know who ran that place, come to think of it. I do know that it was in a location that is currently being used as a soda shop, which is such a Lawrence thing for Lawrence to have: A soda shop that used to be an anarchist bookstore. Anyway, Solidarity man. I only went to one show there, this one, and it was a whole hell of a lot of fun.

I went to see Erin Tobey, who plays guitar in Pink Razors and was headlining the evening with her sweet and lovely folky poppy songs. The fact that there was a band opening that played the same brand of explosive, smart, and hooky pop-punk a la Dillinger Four was a wonderful surprise. Those are the best shows, usually. The ones that catch you off guard with something you weren’t expecting. When that happens I like to buy a record or a t-shirt (in this case I bought both. Despite never listening to this 7” but once after buying it, I wore my Pink Razors t-shirt to death. Literally until it had holes in it and I had to throw it out (I think, actually, it might be in a bag somewhere, but either way I had a shirt, and it had this really great design on it and I wore it forever)) because it’s just the way things are done. A token of respect. The three songs here aren’t aiming to take over the world, but they are certainly enjoyable. I’ve always loved punk bands that play fast and a little aggressive but understand the power of a good hook.

"First Degree"

Gut Feeling: The Hotelier - Home, Like Noplace is There

The Hotelier – Home, Like Noplace Is There

Tiny Engines, 2014

There isn’t enough space on my iPhone for too much music. Frankly, there are too many pictures of my baby, and even though I deleted the blurry ones, there are photos and videos I just can’t bring myself to get rid of even though they’ve been transferred to both my computer and iCloud. For six months, one album has avoided being cut from the 10 or 15 I keep on my phone. Usually, album’s cycle out as I absorb them and review them, but the Hotelier’s Home, Like Noplace Is There gets a stay of deletion. And really, it’s not even close. I haven’t written about this album even though I listen to it at least once a week. It’s one of my favorite albums of the year, and one reason for that is the fact that I haven’t been able to distill this album’s essence into words. It’s full of big, sweeping, grandiose, emotionally intense, heartbreaking, and deeply satisfying songs that resonate on a wave of emotional honesty that I require from any record I’m going to spend a significant amount of time with.

Home, Like Noplace Is There is absolutely relentless. If you’re not getting pummeled by Christian Holden’s devastating vocal performance, you are certainly being pummeled by the big, building guitars weaving some of the most satisfying and moody work the new emo revival has to offer. That, or the perfectly placed whoa-OH-ohs, the beautiful balance of incredible intensity and deathly quiet and the way both of which seem equally capable of shattering your heart. As lovely as this album often is, full of gorgeous melodies and passion, the songs are packed with ugly truths being stared straight in the face. Addiction, death, betrayal, all the heavy stuff heaped over some of the rawest, most compelling music I’ve heard all year. Maybe I’m biased (I did grow up on Brand New and this is hitting those exact same buttons and then some) with my penchant for artists who overshare and songs told in dog metaphors (“Housebroken”), but either way the chest-clearing, catharsis incarnate tone of Home, Like Noplace Is There is something to be heralded.

You can listen to (and acquire) the album in its entirety at Bandcamp, which I recommend as this is a real, proper capital-A Album to be experienced in its sequenced entirety.

"The Scope and All of This Rebuilding"

"Discomfort Revisited"

The Menzingers - Rented World

The Menzingers – Rented World

Epitaph, 2014

Acquired: Half Price Books, Used, 2014

Price: $5

 

Has pop punk been secretly thriving all of these years, or are all the people who grew up on pop punk in the early 00s reviving the genre in their mid-to-late 20s? Either way, there’s something about this new wave of energetic records packed with hooks, sing-a-long harmonies, and big, booming power chords. Scranton, PA’s the Menzingers are as good as anyone when it comes to thoughtful whoa-Oh-oh pop punk. I’d never heard of this band until I saw they were touring with Lemuria (fellow purveyors of thoughtful, catchy music), and of course I stumbled across this album the next week and bought it sight unseen. Er, sound unheard? Either way, it’s something I never do, and something that sent a little thrill down my spine. Sure, it’s exciting to find new music on the internet, but actually taking a risk on a band has become wholly unnecessary in our society and while that’s mostly for the best, there’s something special about taking home a cool looking record, putting it on the turntable, and unlocking the mystery.

When the Menzingers are at their best they remind me of the first Killers album. I hope that doesn’t come across as an insult, because that record has some of the catchiest songs I’ve ever heard. Earworms that reside in my brain til this day. And tracks like “Where Your Heartache Exists” massage that part of my brain that lives on grandiose pop music. The Menzingers are smarter than the Killers, and they have more heart. My favorite surprise from Rented World is the excellent songwriting. The music is so good, the lyric sheet doesn’t need to be anything special, but it is anyway. The songs are wordy, but Tom May and Greg Barnett are more than capable of wrapping them around these potentially overpowering tracks.

I’m a grown ass man, but I’m enjoying this album the same way I would have when I was sixteen. The big change though is I am now better equipped to appreciate the ebb and flow. The tracks needn’t all be high-octane bangers to get my seal of approval, and the slower tracks peppered in to give the album texture (the lovely “Transient Love” and the heartwrenching acoustic closer “When You Died” help to make Rented World more than just another punk rock recordthe invasion) are some of my favorites. Better still, when the tracks switch tempo midstream, as on “In Remission,” which I can’t stop listening to. Equal parts anthemic and sensitive, the Menzingers do a great job of subverting expectations and manage to put their own stamp on a well-worn genre.

"In Remission"

"I Don't Wanna Be an Asshole Anymore"

Fugazi - 3 Songs EP

Fugazi – 3 Songs EP

Dischord, 1989 (Reissue)

Acquired: Half Price Books, Used, 2014

Price: $1.50

1991 is often used as a touchstone for the birth of alternative rock out of the drum-machine and hair metal addled 80s. In 1989 DC’s Fugazi rose from the ashes of Minor Threat and released their first collection of tracks with the seminal 13 Songs compilation album, preceding the grunge explosion by two years and illustrating a clear evolution from the rapid fire hardcore punk to the more artful and post-punk influenced world of post-hardcore. These early Fugazi tracks have all the edge of blistering hardcore punk, but there’s more emotion, and there’s a whole hell of a lot more technical prowess. The 3 Songs EP was tacked onto the end of the band’s first proper LP Repeater, but serves as a bridge between their earlier 13 Songs material and shows absolutely no signs of letting up. In my world, Fugazi is just as important as the Beatles. I’d rather listen to Repeater than The White Album any day of the week. The stuff that resonates the most isn’t the emotion that comes through in these songs. It’s not surprising, since this band is effectively a mash-up of Rites of Spring and Embrace, two bands that immediately come up anytime anyone wants to talk about Emo (in the legit sense of the genre, not the weepy music made by tattooed wimps that took over the genre in the 00s). Guy Picciotto and Ian MacKaye sing with the passion of religious men. There is a sense of justification in Fugazi’s music that you don’t really hear too often. This is like the Beethoven of indie rock: something timeless that people will be calling real music in two-hundred years.

"Song Number One"

Gut Feeling: Guitar - Come Summer Come Blues - The Abandoned House of Micha Lueckner & Susi Tunn in 14 Songs

Guitar – Come Summer Come Blues – The Abandoned House of Micha Lueckner & Susi Tunn in 14 Songs

Self-Released, 2014

In our modern age, where everyone can know everything about everything, it’s nice to stumble across a band with an ungoogleable name, give their album a listen because it has an interesting title, and just go along for the ride. The band’s website runs like a messy flash game, but I was able to glean some information. Notably that Guitar hails from Cologne, Germany and showcases the output of Michael Lueckner and Tokyo-based vocalist/co-songwriter Ayako Akashiba. The site explains Guitar’s intent at its inception in the early 00s was “to produce new unique guitar-based songs and sounds that normal guitar bands do not or can not produce” and then how this idea was abandoned in favor of using all sorts of instruments.

The result is a lovely and strange hodgepodge that very much reminds me of the records of the Books. Yet where the Books championed a sort of electronic music/audio collage blend, Come Summer Come Blues feels more like an audio scrapbook. The songs blend and fold together, but the influences are pretty wide. Shoegaze, trip hop, folk, minimal techno, ambient, and post-rock elements are spread pretty equally throughout the record recalling My Bloody Valentine, Sigur Ros, Portishead, and Kraftwerk (because of course). Not to mention a significant Japanese influence that is not entirely limited to Akashiba’s beautiful vocals. The most surprising moments are when actual structured songs take form out of the sprawling sonics (notably “Spiders are Lonely Demons Dwelling On Your Attic,” which sounds, of all things, like early Death Cab for Cutie). There’s also a transcendently beautiful acoustic guitar interlude titled “Love Won’t Fade” that blew me away. There’s nothing that special about it, but the way it serves as a palate cleanser in this sensory overload of an album is pretty great. After that, it cuts back into sparse, looped and reversed electronics and we remember where we are: An album that is also a hall of mirrors, reflecting back things we have heard before in a unique and inventive way.

You can listen to the album in its entirety over at Bandcamp:

Pinback - Information Retrieved Pt. B 7"

Pinback – Information Retrieved Pt. B 7”

Temporary Residence, 2011

Acquired: Half Price Books, Used, 2013

Price: $1

Despite not knowing what band made this 7”, I bought it based on the really pretty cover art. With a little research at home, I discovered that this is the second of three 7”s Pinback released for Record Store Day in 2011. The three 7”s featured singles from the group’s most recent LP: 2012’s Information Retrieved. The 7” was supposed to come in a paper sleeve that listed the vital information (and even included Pinback/Record Store Day evidence tape!). I’m a fan of fun packaging, and the evidence theme of this 7” is a neat enough treat that it outweighs my hate for bands leaving their goddamn band name off the goddamn record and sleeve. Even more fun: the b-side ends in a locked groove that plays an “annoying, high pitched mechanical noise,” which is listed on the fake evidence form that comprises the inside of the sleeve. Oh yeah, and I suppose there are songs, too. BUT THAT PACKAGING! Pinback has always been one of those bands that I’ll enjoy while listening to their music, but totally forget what they sound like the second it stops playing. It’s the same way with Broken Social Scene. Totally fine, technically well crafted, but lacking whatever it is that encourages memorability. I am making it sound worse than it actually is. A-Side “True North” is a lovely piece of moody indie rock with a bit of prog-rock influence tossed in for good measure. The band is tight and the music is enjoyable, but I just can’t pin down what is missing. But in all likelihood, nothing is missing and this just doesn’t press my buttons the way it might press the buttons of others. The b-side “Cload ‘Q’” is just as good, and I’m thinking maybe Pinback’s place in my catalog is as a band that crafts excellent background music. These tracks seems perfect for late night illustration sessions.

"True North"

Wilson Pickett - "I'm in Love" 45

Wilson Pickett – “I’m in Love” 45

Atlantic, 1967

Acquired: Crossroads Music Exchange, Used, 2013

Price: $1

Considering that Wilson Pickett cannot be fucked with, I knew this one was probably going to be a safe bet. In my head, “I’m in Love” was going to be Pickett’s version of the John Lennon penned “I’m in Love” (sapped of all emotion by the Fourmosts who popularized the track). Though the time period is right, I don’t know why I thought this was going to be that song, but at a buck, with someone as eternally excellent as Pickett, there was no reason not to take a chance. This “I’m in Love” (written by Bobby Womack, who wrote many of Pickett’s late 60s hits) is an impassioned, soulful ballad that doesn’t even have to try. It floats on a mournful little guitar riff and Pickett’s croon. Horns show up on the chorus with the backing vocals to round out a terrific single. B-Side “Stag-O-Lee” is Pickett’s boisterous rendition of the traditional folk tune “Stagger Lee” about a pimp wasting a dude in order to get back his brand new Stetson hat after losing it in a hand of cards. It’s rather grisly murder ballad towards the end, but that only makes the pairing with the upbeat R&B more entertaining.

"I'm in Love" 

"Stag-O-Lee"

Pest 5000 - "Cold Feet" 7"

Pest 5000 – “Cold Feet” 7”

Derivative!, 1996

Acquired: Love Garden Shotgun Room, Used, 2008

Price: $.25

Canadian group Pest 5000 operated from 1993-1997, and it really doesn’t get any more mid 90s than that. Their sound is like a warm blanket. I have a very strong connection to that time period in regard to music. It’s when I did a good deal of growing up, and when I started developing my taste in music. Not to say it was good taste, but I realized that the glossy mainstream pop that we listened to when the neighbors carpooled us to school was unappealing and that I’d much rather listen to the glossy mainstream alternative rock that co-dominated the radio waves in that post-Nirvana period. Gin Blossoms, Goo Goo Dolls, Everclear, Bush, Dishwalla. Those bands got scratched into my soul over the various summers of my youth. Pest 5000’s lo-fi indie pop was the alternative to the alternative. While they were also benefactors of the grungy atomic bomb that hit the reset button on popular music in 1991. “Cold Feet” is a fuzzy, catchy little number that deserves to be played on repeat. It isn’t as dated as a lot of the music from that period and sounds a lot like the bedroom pop being crafted by thousands of twentysomethings in 2014 (the more experimental, electro leaning b-side “Where the Moon is” doesn’t hold up nearly as well). Pest 5000 win extra points for having released one of the last 7”s on the bygone and beloved Harriet Records label. In the group’s five-year lifespan, they released one full length LP, an album of b-sides and remixes, and a handful of 7”s. It’s a respectable offering from a period where bands seemed to exist for a couple of 7”s and vanished off the face of the earth (or, more likely, were dissolved into other bands).

"X-ing Things," from the band's lone LP Interabang. 

Gut Feeling: A Sunny Day in Glasgow - Sea When Absent

A Sunny Day in Glasgow – Sea When Absent

Lefse Records, 2014

Fewer things are satisfying than falling head over heels in love with a band upon the release of their fourth album. It means there are three more records to devour and an opportunity to trace the band’s evolution from their humble beginnings to the moment they blew your mind. A Sunny Day in Glasgow craft a weird and wonderful alchemical pop music. It’s like electro pop, but the electronics and synthesizers are muted, distorted and subdued to a point where they feel totally organic. They feel like a ripe, fuzzy peach, buoyed by the sweet, often tandem, vocals of Annie Fredrickson and Jen Goma, with the guitars occasionally slicing through and adding both a sense of grandness to these humble bedroom pop arrangements.

Despite the group’s American roots, their sweet, hazy pop songs recall a gentler My Bloody Valentine and feel like an evolved version of the Sarah Records bands of yesteryear. Though the songs aim for the ethereal, they always feel personal. The songs are so intimate that it seems like a bit of trickery that there wasn’t a time during Sea When Absent’s recording when the whole band was together in the same room. But then again, the modern world excels at keeping us connected to each other even when we are far apart, and this album feels like a testament to technology’s double-edged sword. It’s a great record to put on, sit back, and soak up.

"In Love With Useless"