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““Hailing from Springfield, Missouri” frequently precedes SSLYBY’s introduction in write-ups and reviews, that association of band and place meant to locate the name in a homey, small-town sound. But the thing is, the band isn´t really from anywhere — I mean to say, yes, they have a hometown, and of course they go to bed at night somewhere, but the need to preclude description with location (oh, they´re from that specific town) is entirely at odds with what they write and sing about. Way back on “Oregon Girl” from Broom, Will announces to his stately sweetie that “Oregon Girl / I´ve been around the world / and I´ve never seen another / Oregon girl.” The band´s been all over, and if anything, it´s the geographic that fails to connect, that aboriginal “Oregon Girl” who will never appear again and yet who remains a fixture in the specificity of the song´s mountain-moving desire (see also Cora, Ellie, Rachel Lara, Anna Lee, Gwyneth, and now Everlyn). Even Pershing, with its Springfield-isms (have you ever sat on top of the HEERS building?) was largely conceived, according to the band´s own travelogue, in Moscow. For a band that is reintroduced time after time by that pinpointing Springfield, MO placemat, it would seem that the songs seek to distance them from name and place altogether.
Everyone knows how much this band means to me (a little too much, maybe), so it´s a pleasure for me to find that their latest Let It Sway will be released on August 17th via Polyvinyl. In line with talking about travel, this record took the guys across the US to record with Chris Walla and to find several other ladies to write songs about. I just received my digital copy a few days ago, and I’m loving every second of it — they’ve found a way to synthesize virtually every influence on this one, and it serves for some moments of eerie promnesia (tell me you don’t hear Pinkerton on “Phantomwise,” or Nothing Feels Good in the closing bars of “Stuart Gets Lost”) and, better still, new insta-classics that’ll soon become inextricably bond to memories of my late summer months.
You can check out more from SSLYBY at their page on Polyvinyl. I also recommend heading over to iamwarmandpowerful.com for alternate takes, live performances, demos and other miscellany. As a former Tape Club member myself (Phil sent me the last SSLYBY pin!), I’m very, very pleased to find all these nice things available in one place.
And as you can tell, we’re on a summer hiatus here at Girlpants. I hope you’re well, and that you’re doing something somewhere that means just that.
They’ve got Nedelle and what’s-his-face from Deerhoof. And tracks like “Blue Tears” and “” are just too much fun to leave for the last decade. “My Thomania,” which can (but probably shouldn’t) be treated as the title track for the album, contributes to a veritable potluck of –manias going on in 09, “Lisztomania” being a principal one, but also the lesser-known and rarely-acknowledged “Tulipomania” that I found at a used book store this past weekend being also important. Just listen for the chorus. [
Remember how I said I didn’t like Acid House Kings? Well, I think I cracked a bit on that position after my friend Eric D. put Memoirs on a few weeks ago. Like the Kings, the Postmarks craft pop like it’s something you sneeze out occasionally. Oh look, another perfect-pop booger. It’s like that. If this song doesn’t make your tears pink then something’s not working right. [
It’s the guy from Page France being all mopey, but it works. Even the most desolate tracks like “Gone the Bells” have a shimmer and bounce about them, that the entire album comes off bright-headed from a slow-burned haze. Apparently, the full band title is/was “The Cotton Jones Basket Ride,” which I’m starting to think describes a travelin’ sensation buried somewhere on this record. [
Simplicity is strategy on Apple’s Acre. The entire record is built on vocal harmonies and light percussion. In many ways, it feels like Two Dancers turned inside-out: the same morbid curiosities occupy Nurses, and the insistent pull of rhythm and melody is at once haunting and mesmerizing. “Lita” is my favorite track, and it’ll be yours too soon enough. [
There’s no bad Hayden album, and there’s no bad Hayden song. I think Hayden fans have come to expect this from him year after year, which is why The Place Where We Live is somewhat disappointing. So I guess I’ve included “Let’s Break Up” on that principle alone: it’s yet another charming Hayden narrative about coincidence, failure, and self-deprecation. Even though you could call all that a big whiney complaint, thing is, I wouldn’t want it any other way. [
Not to be confused with that band I mix’d about back in Feb., The Love Language is a frontispiece for Stuart McLamb’s four-track recordings. Here McLamb’s booming, theatrical affectation butts heads with micromanaged orchestration and that washed-out (frequently clipping) tendency of the high peaks on record. Overall this is a fun listen, and if you’re interested check out “Lalita,” “Nocturne” and “Nightdogs” as well. [
I don’t get this song, but I like it. I think she’s Norwegian or something, and her other albums are supposed to be insta-hit material, so check those out after you listen to “Bandy Riddles.” Also, this album takes the album cake for coolest album cover on the mix, with runner-up being them dogs in Dog Day, featured in the stuff that follows this stuff. [
Make no mistake, this is the latest American Analog Set record. On “Seven Seventeen,” Andrew’s hushed voice is still smooth as glass, and the palm-muted, strummed percussion sets the pace to heartbeat. Just cue Leslie on backing vocals and bring in some thick tremolo. Beautiful song, beautiful album; expect nothing less from these folk. [
Jonathan Johansson, for lack of a better introduction, is from another world. His music is thoroughly engaging, often spirited and triumphant, and lyrically incomprehensible to most of his admiring audience. He’s definitely not an alien, but his music manages to sound otherworldly while rooting that unfamiliarity of language in a familiar cultural nostalgia; Jonathan’s point-by-point reduction of 1980s electro-pop titans into his own earnest compositions resonates with the sounds of the era while somehow transcending the period altogether. I love this record from start to finish; it feels like I’ve known every melody on it for quite some time, and I plan to enjoy them for years to come. [
There’s a particular mythos to this album that I don’t think anyone outside of my family knows. I don’t mean that to seem even remotely insulting, it’s just something very oblique, even to the people for whom this album matters most. “Loki Grimm” was the name of one of my dad’s various bands in the 70s. During this time, Dad ran a paper route in the Bronx on his bike and used that money to pay for a studio room to practice in. I guess you can call him a studio musician here, given that he practiced for eight hours a day, playing various gigs as they came up. The name “Loki Grimm” is itself borrowed, and I think this is a reoccurring theme in Paul’s work; later on in the decade, Dad and co. would take the name “Train Wreck” from a headlining band after said band didn’t show for their first gig. I can see the decision made in an instant that night at the Emelin Theatre, although I know that there’s more to it than mere happenstance. For Paul, I think that the title for his first album is, of course, in direct reference to this exchange, but it’s also about the spectre of this figure on our lives: Loki Grimm suggests a trickster, a devil in pantomime, an acknowledgment of something (or someone) beyond death. Death is an important theme (for Paul and me alike), and there’s no listening to this record without encountering just that: “Loki Grimm is always waiting / to take you back with him,” Paul concludes on the title track. With his introduction in “The Devil’s in the Fog,” the pale shadow arrives early in the record, yet Paul always seems to welcome it: “Lead the way / through the darkness, / I am not afraid,” cautioning to the listener to “please take your time with him, / he killed me once, / he’ll do it again.” Immediately thereafter is Paul’s rumination on death and dreaming in “Sleepwalker,” a song I’ve seen take stage over the past few years in many different formations, and the search for lost love in “My New Dynamic.”
Paul immediately went to work after Loki Grimm on a new batch of songs that soon became Lazuli. I remember that the title had been picked out long before any tracks were recorded. It’s a completely different album than the last, which I think is a response to comments from friends that the first is a slow and sad; it’s heavy, it’s fast, and a bit more optimistic. But for several reasons, Paul never did anything with this album. There’s no true album cover for it either. In many ways, this album is a product of the first *true* Quiet River line-up, with Nate on guitar, Matt on bass, and Jack Beal on percussion. For that reason I’ve less to speculate about this record – it’s not Paul’s album in the same sense as Loki Grimm, although in many ways it’s much more consistent in tone and pacing – and simply that much more to praise about the music itself. 
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