>>Nostalgia For Infinity

It’s a little hard for me to write about Banquets. This–I will explain for the benefit of newcomers–is because a little over a year ago I reviewed an EP of theirs. Then, a few months ago, I reviewed a split that they released.

You may notice that the tone between those two reviews shifts a little. During the first review they were a new band to me. I liked them but wanted more from them. During the second review I still felt they lacked a little something, but by god did I ramble upon about just why I like Banquets as a band.

Irrelevant, irreverent context: after my first review one of the dudes in the band emailed me to thank me for a thoughtful review. After the second review, they didn’t even link it from their Facebook. Yep: my review sounded like the expurgation of an embarrassing fan.

(That’s unfair on both Banquets and myself. I just thought it might prove amusing. In fact, it’s probably only that my review emerged long after the release of the split.)

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It’s a source of some pleasure for me that, even as I wind up Nostalgia For Infinity’s lengthy stint as a full-time music reviewing site (if you can call 2/3 reviews a week “full time” – although coming from just one guy, I suppose the description is fair), I’m able to return to artists I’ve previously subjected to my words and thoughts. And here’s Ghost Robot Ninja Bear, the ‘new’ project from Oscar Albis Rodriguez – a man who has, in the past, played with luminaries such as Nakatomi Plaza, Ludlow Lions and, er, The Dexter Lake Club Band, “NYC’s premier wedding band”. Well, maybe weddings in NYC are way cooler than they are here in Sussex.

I last reviewed the excellently and absurdly named GRNB in September ’10 when I took a look at an EP rounding up a collection of singles from the preceding year; I was duly impressed. Rodriguez is a man with some chops, a fact which – even if not immediately obvious from his impressive songwriting – becomes clear when you recognise that the band features numerous other musicians, mostly drawn from bands with which Rodriguez has had some involvement in the past. And yet so few people mention them! So hey, shout outs to Geoff Kraly, Gunnar Olson, Jordan Melkin, Brendan Coon and Al Fair (I particularly dig Bridge & Tunnel, so extra kudos to that dude).

So here we have GRNB’s first full-length release, and it’s an impressive collection of tunes. As with the earlier EP and singles the songs on offer are fundamentally poppy but technically considered and proficient; despite being catchy and immediate they’re possessed of delightful depth. ‘The Curtain Call’, for example, has a strong 90s EpiFat punk rock vibe to it, laying down staccato rhythms in the verse and marrying the vocal delivery to that, with more straightforward choruses to keep things powering forwards. And yet even within a song so obviously, straightforwardly pop-punk, there’s impressive use of dynamics and digital effects to spice up the mix.

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Okay, straight up. You know it and I know it. Despondenseas is a terrible name. In the leagues of puns, it sinks below the sort of material your dad might come out with. “A dyslexic man walks into a bra.” Oh god! We’re almost talking teen poetry on LiveJournal sort of territory here. Earlier today I read an, uh, ‘poem’ on DeviantArt titled ‘Last Resort 2‘. You laugh at it, and then you feel pity. Damn, dude, you put that shit on the internet?

Fortunately, and I’m genuinely happy to share this fact, Stand Your Ground rise above that title. It doesn’t feel like there’s any sense of irony about it; they’re not a playful band, there’s no self-deprecation here; they play metal and there’s a strong sense of emotional fatigue or even despair about it. It’s a solid record and among the standard metal riffage there are some great bits of high-end lead, octave chords and delay/sustain guitar effects that, frankly, demonstrate a grasp of dynamics that still seems to be beyond a lot of metal bands.

(Metal fans may at this point respond by pointing out that a lot of the bands I love have yet to move beyond the power chord. And also I openly adore octave chords, which are one note removed from power chords. I know. Music reviewing is subjective. That’s why it’s fun.)

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Question 1: Do you like these lyrics from Ohio’s Tin Armor?

We’re living a life of abundance
the squalor of rentals aside
We cherish our things and live beyond our means
to the tune of our paychecks demise

We’re living a life of reluctance
the impulse under the influence aside
We hold on to our peace and we stay in our seats
and we haunt each other’s halls all night

Well they say one in hand is better than two beside
and most times it’s hard not to agree
But of my actions left aside
it’s just not alright that there are so many

Question 2: Does your collection of music include some of the following?

Cory Branan, Ben Folds, Drag the River, Drive By Truckers, The Weakerthans, Okkervil River, Armchair Martian, Wilco, Austin Lucas, Lucero.

If the answer to either or both questions is ‘yes’, the odds are good that you will enjoy Life of Abundance.

I’m well aware that this ‘review’ looks, well, pretty fucking lazy. Rest assured that I’ve been dwelling on this one for a while. My problem is that while I dig this record I’ve got nothing in particular to say about it. That’s a bit of a disappointment. The last time I went to an alt-country gig – bear in mind I live in the UK, too – it was an awesome experience. The night’s players mixed and matched and improvised and articipated; it was a thoroughly organic moment full of personality and uniqueness. Cory Branan bought my friends and I some shots. Austin Lucas wandered around through the audience whilst playing songs and made everything feel approximately 40,000% more special. Another friend made 50% of Drag the River play my favourite songs before I arrived at the show. A historical song that made me think and feel in a more powerful way than I recalled from recent memory. It was an event.

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Apparently Philly bands are a thing right now on NFI. There’s no intentional pattern to it, folks, I’m just writing about what I’ve been sent. Still, recently we’ve had reviews of Empire! Empire! and Hightide Hotel, and to the output of that state we can add Luther.

They’re band with not much of a story. This isn’t too their detriment; I’ve just not been able to dig up much info online. One thing that I have been able to find, from one of the two labels which published this record, is the phrase “a natural nervousness”. Kind of an odd phrase, huh? It’s in reference to the music, sure, but slinging a phrase like “natural nervousness” into the mix when you’re writing about a band is suggestive in itself. It suggests that Luther are a band who prefer to let the music take centre stage, to keep the players in the background while what they create speaks for itself.

What it speaks of is a band who are, well, a really pleasant listen. There’s a decent amount of variance here, between songs that strike a relaxed balance between minimalism and midpace as in ‘Siblings’ – vocally focused, highlighting the emotional quality of the vocals, the gentle dexterity of a few simple guitar picks and those subtle ambient touches that flesh out such a song – and more driving numbers such as ‘There’s Always Money’, a track that reminds me unexpectedly of Cattle Drums in that, frankly, the octave chords in the verses are to fucking die for.

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The impressively-named Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate) have only been reviewed in the briefest of forms here on NFI: they contributed a single song toward a split with Into It. Over It. It wasn’t much to base an opinion on a band around but it was a gentle and melancholic piece of music that I enjoyed well enough.

Home After Three Months Away is a four-track EP from the band, with all four tracks around the two or three minute mark. Opening with ‘The Loneliness Inside Me Is A Place’ – a cringe-worthy title, if I’m on honest – things get off to a bad start; whilst the guitar noodling is quite inventive and playful the chord progressions don’t have much going for them. The song also builds steadily over its length but the effect of this is mitigated by the band’s determination to remain so very mellow.

Fortunately things feel more active when we come to ‘Water’, a comparatively energetic tune thanks to plenty of crashing and trembling cymbals, more charming guitar noodling and some clean palm-mutes in the verses. » Read the rest of this entry «

Just last weekend I published a review of Snowing’s I Could Do Whatever I Wanted If I Wanted and much of what I said about that record could be broadly applied to Hightide Hotel’s Nothing Was Missing Except Me. Both bands, in fact, hail from LeHigh Valley Philadelphia, and odds are good that they’ve shared more than a few stages in their time.

I’ll approach this review a little differently to how I normally might, as I’m actually writing this mere minutes after typing up my thoughts on the Snowing record, and I’m hesitant to repeat myself. If you’ve randomly browsed by, I suggest clicking here to read last weekend’s review. If you’ve already read it and are wavering on whether or not to keep reading this, then I’ll save you some trouble either way: if you dig Snowing, you will probably dig Hightide Hotel as well. Ditto if you like Grown Ups or Castevet or Meet Me In St. Louis, and so on. We cool?

So to start things off, it’s worth noting that Hightide Hotel have a playful and almost ambivalent attitude as their hometown friends: that much is obvious from the title of the first song, ‘I’m Just Sippin’ On Monster, Thinkin’ About Life’. Srs themes makin’ for srs business! The song’s a pacy number, too, although it eschews variety in favour of repeating and looping its licks and riffs at speed, with the rhythm section laying down a fast tempo with lead guitar noodling about over the top of it.

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