Gregor Samsa
Rest
The Kora
originally published May 14, 2008
Often a subject of much controversy, there is a psychoacoustic phenomenon known as “binaural beats” in which two indistinguishably differing frequencies produced in a pair of headphones will create an apparent pulsing at the difference of the two frequencies (oftentimes below the human range of human hearing, or 20Hz), which in effect, has been purported to increase communication between the two hemispheres of the brain.
Whether or not the benefits of brain entrainment hold true to their claims, one can almost feel the alpha and beta brainwaves being traced by the contours of the music upon listening to Gregor Samsa’s Rest. An album of painstaking subtlety, Rest demands a solitary listen in headphones, as its lush sound is the direct result of its brilliant exploration of the stereo field.
Though the album’s soft-spoken lyrics occasionally detract from the sheer elegance of the music, its crowning achievement rests in its use of tone color. Through unique timbral associations, the album’s trembling pianos, gamelan-style percussion, wine glass-like synths, and tremelo-processed vocals blend into an indistinguishable mass of sound, as though the mind were slowly scanning through a slide show of a barren cerebral landscape. The Phillip Glass-inspired “Abutting, Dismantling” relies upon the static repetition of a C-minor chord against a rotating patchwork of murmuring woodwinds, cellos and vibraphones before fading into “Company” - a short, ambient work shrouded in Sigur Rós-sized reverb. It’s not until “Jeroen Van Aken” that the album breaks from its trance-like stupor, with its abrupt realization - “It seems that death has got a grip on me.”
Ghostland Observatory
Robotique Majestique
Trashy Moped Recordings
originally published May 14, 2008
Aiming to create dancefloor anthems, the Austin, TX band Ghostland Observatory takes a minimalist approach - it’s really just front man Aaron Behrens and producer/drummer Thomas Turner - to a maximalist sound, that of throbbing, mid-‘90s electronica, club-ready and bridging the gap between icy technology and grimy human bodies. Behrens specializes in a hyper-emphatic, round-voweled-yet-breathy sort of delivery that’s not too far off from Freddie Mercury, and for those who’d prefer a more elemental experience with electronic dance music, well, his vocals only pop up on about half the tunes as it is.
From the plinky, rubbery synth intro on “The Band Marches On” to the the more churning basslines of the instrumental track “Holy Ghost White Noise,” there’s nothing particularly new that Robotique Majestique offers up. But new’s not the point with an album like Robotique Majestique; it aims to incite giddy dancing, and its incessant rock-influenced Euro-dance tunes provide that very opportunity, regardless of whether that’s already been done recently (Head Automatica) or near-perfectly (Daft Punk).
In fact, the album’s biggest drawback is that it is an album (not to get too extratextual here), and inherently lacks the visual stimulus associated with Ghostland Observatory’s captivatingly showy live performances - Behrens often gets soaked with sweat as he prances about the stage in ridiculous costumes, while Turner does the same in front of a laptop, clad in a cape. Robotique Majestique suggests strongly at that visceral experience, though it never quite captures it (the frenetic, yowly, Kathleen Hanna-conjuring “HFM” comes pretty damn close, however).
So: Derivative? Yes. But fun? Also, yes.
Ghostland Observatory is playing in Atlanta at Centennial Olympic Park on Saturday, May 17.
Loxsly
Flashlights
Independent Release
originally published May 14, 2008
The do-it-yourself indie-rock band from Austin, TX, Loxsly sounds like emo’s more optimistic little brother; except in this case, the band took the extra step of digging through its elder brother’s closet, ripping out a page from his 1974 Nautical Almanac, and defiling the margins with a hand-written note in order to promote the new EP, Flashlights, to the Flagpole (unless it was the band's publicist, than I’d be really impressed). On the Beaufort Scale of 0–12, I would rate the album’s calm and collected atmosphere around a 4 (11–16 knots), for a moderate breeze…
Loxsly’s four-song EP is a tightly produced and concise effort, and it evokes a similar mood to the quirky power-pop style that The Bens (Folds, Lee and Kweller all-star collaboration) delivered on their aptly titled four-song EP, The Bens. Though the latter of the two EPs never took itself quite seriously, Loxsly’s driving mid-tempo rock is tinged with a slightly more haunting charm reminiscent of My Morning Jacket and The Flaming Lips, remaining experimental only when called for. Occasionally, bittersweet synth-arpeggios resound like an abandoned Apple IIGS crying out from the ocean floor to a world that has turned its back on its inferior computational abilities; otherwise, it’s a guiltless listen.
Now, perhaps I’m taking this too far, but the arrangement to Loxsly’s “Virgin Isles” sounds strikingly similar to the Beach Boys' “That’s Not Me” (Pet Sounds), and I’m trying to figure out if there’s some abstract connection to the seahorse on the album cover, but I’ve become distracted by all these nostalgic sailboat photographs…
Drakkar Sauna
Wars and Tornadoes: Drakkar Sauna Faithfully Sing Songs of The Louvin Brothers
Marriage
originally published May 14, 2008
Lawrence, KS duo Wallace Cochran and Jeff Stoltz look like a couple of hipster goofballs, complete with ironic facial hair and thrift-store clothing. Their inability to behave seriously in an interview or when providing information about themselves (“When Jeff Stoltz was young, he hunted boar in Pretoria and watched, doe-eyed and silent, while his father used his skill as a jungle fighter to install de Klerk as state president”) only reinforces this impression.
But this album of nine Louvin Brothers covers is sincere and wonderful, or at least comparably sincere and wonderful to The Louvin Brothers’ own renditions of these old-timey close-harmony tunes. There is much about death and faith and marriage in the lyrics, which come out of a dyed-in-the-wool Southern evangelical tradition, but the brothers mixed a little Smothers in with their Stanley (cf. the cover of their album Satan Is Real), which may have been what intrigued the modern alt-country dudes.
Cochran and Stoltz can’t quite match Ira and Charlie in vocal awesomeness, but the album is simply recorded in a way that calls the originals to mind much more than the pristine tones of many a revivalist effort, and it’s all delivered with nary a hint of irony. Presumably, Drakkar Sauna loves The Louvin Brothers a lot, which results in the album feeling like a particularly successful encounter with a buddy who wants to spin all his new audio finds for you. It doesn’t say anything about their ability as songwriters, but it testifies nicely to their musical talents and enthusiasm.
No Age
Nouns
Sub Pop
originally published May 14, 2008
The album's called Nouns, but there are also plenty of affirmative adjectives to describe the first full-length from Los Angeles noise/punk duo No Age. Gorgeous. Fun. Intriguing. There's also awesome, because this band has yet to misstep. After releasing a collection of vinyl singles last year on Fat Cat Records, Weirdo Rippers, Sub Pop came calling, and No Age was picked up for its first cohesive album. And a great one it is.
Both genres, noise and punk, tend to scare off a lot of listeners and bring to mind assaultive, punishing feedback and guitars, respectively, but No Age never gets harsh. Guitarist Randy Randall keeps his distortion on the soft side, sounding closer to California pop-punk than any British glue-sniffers, while both he and drummer/vocalist Dean Spunt fiddle with samplers to produce gauzy, lilting sounds that might recall listening to the movement of the interstate on a clear summer night.
A lot of hoo-ha gets made about No Age's do-it-yourself ethics, artistic ambitions and connections to art scenes, and while all of that stuff is cool, this is a music review. When not bashing out two-chord, unpretentious punk, Spunt and Randall trade off on ethereal interludes that often bring the punk crashing back in explosive drum kicks. “Keechie” is an instrumental folky track eeking out of an AM radio before segueing into the slashing “Sleeper Hold.”
Nouns is a short listen at 30 minutes, but the duo plays like a ninja squad. In. Rock. Out. Crammed into your subconscious before you realize what's happened. Despite the genres No Age operates in, Nouns is a peaceful, engaging listen. It's albums like this that are meant for the summer; ready to be soaked in and valued.
Neil Hamburger
Sings Country Winners
Drag City
originally published May 14, 2008
Depending on where you stand on the in-joke that is Neil Hamburger, Sings Country Winners qualifies as either the funniest bad album of the year or the most excruciating listen that the uninitiated will have to endure in quite some time - which is probably exactly what Hamburger wants.
In the tradition of Tony Clifton, Andy Kaufman’s foul mouthed, horribly off-key lounge lizard persona, Neil Hamburger is not a stereotypical comedian. The timing is off, the jokes aren’t funny and are often cringe-inducing. With that being said, Neil Hamburger can be pretty funny once listeners get past his intentionally negative qualities.
On Sings Country Winners, Hamburger stammers and pauses awkwardly through 10 rather convincingly authentic sounding country songs. While some songs are side splittingly hilarious diatribes by Hamburger (“The Recycle Bin”), others are unfunny and almost trying to get through (“Jugtown”), even if you are one of the listeners who gets the joke that is Neil Hamburger.
But the songs are wonderfully played by Prairie Prince (of The Tubes), Atom Ellis (of Dieselhead) and Rachel Haden (formerly of That Dog and The Rentals), who all do a great job of making the music as authentic to the classic Country & Western sound as possible, although not as lush and lavish as Ween’s 12 Golden Country Greats.
Sings Country Winners may neither be a laugh riot nor will it help to break Hamburger into the mainstream, but it is a rather fun little album that is good for a listen every once in a while. Maybe that’s what Hamburger wanted all along.
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