>>Nostalgia For Infinity

Yet another rad US band ploughing a furrow of ambient, emotive music, Everyone Everywhere stand apart from the crowd thanks to a real knack for dynamic songwriting and an evocative warmth that emerges from their musical compositions and lyrical subject matter. Leisurely is another term that applies well to this LP; whilst hardly sedate the listener has the sensation that Everyone Everywhere are proceeding at exactly the pace they wish to. And they would say to hell with everyone else, but really they’re too mellow that, so why not just hang and jam instead?

Sonically they have a buzzy, fuzzy guitar sound with a lot of resonance; there’s minimal gain and distortion here but simultaneously it’s a full sound and far from sparse. Melodic, soothing vocals and some great double-time chord progressions underpinned by a warm, vibrant bass sound and rounded percussion complete the effect. There are quite a few instrumental parts which work really nicely, emphasising when the vocals kick in. Lyrically their singer focuses on personal stories and anecdotes, using them to paint a broader, more universal picture.

A definitely highlight is ‘Raw Bar’, which exhibits some of the aforementioned killer chords, and opener ‘Tiny Planet’ with its extended instrumental intro before cutting right back for the lazily drawled vocal refrain “Oh, I’ve got bigger fish to fry”. There’s a subtle and gentle wit at work throughout as evidenced by the catchy and sly final vocals of closing number ‘Obama House, Fukui Prefecture’: “Warm and comfortable / Purely functional”.

Everyone Everywhere are well worth your time and I heartily recommend you check them out. I’m writing this review at about 11pm after spending 12 hours at work, coming home and working on some freelance copywriting for another few hours, and I’ve found this record’s faintly nostalgic tone, varied songwriting, highly competent yet suitably understated musicianship and easygoing, accessible yet far from banal subject matter to be a great comfort. That’s not to pin the band as a one-trick or one-mood outfit; more that this melodic emo/indie-rock derived music is comfortable and pleasant and will probably resonate with a lot of people, wherever they find themselves whilst listening.

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Books on music can be a funny thing. The old saying that writing about music is like dancing about architecture holds as true with the long form as it ever does (by which I mean, shut up, I will write about music as much as I like). This leaves authors a few options: to focus on the autobiographical aspect of their subjects, to focus on their cultural impact, or to adopt a more historical fact-checking technique. The latter is probably the method I struggle with the most as it demands an already somewhat encyclopaedic knowledge of its subject from the reader; this is a problem I had with the one book of Ian Glasper’s I’ve read. To be fair, such books are intended as more of a resource to be dipped into than something to be read cover-to-cover.

Examining the cultural impact of various bands or a scene can be equally tricky; manage it just right and you have something like Our Band Could Be Your Life, a book so successful and widely-read that it re-introduced many of the classic 80s bands it championed to a generation growing up with bands several generations down the line. You can also end up wallowing in cliche, romanticising history and aggrandising it to an almost embarrassing point – such as any number of books about punk written by people who lost interest after ’79. (You can usually find these books in shops specialising in unsold trade paperbacks and hardbacks; they can usually bought quite cheaply. Ha!)

Then there is the autobiographical approach. This has the inherent strength that most people, being people, tend to find reading about other people interesting. It also has the risk that, well, most people lead quite boring lives, even those in famous bands. And I don’t just mean clean-living; after you’ve read a few coke or booze or glue-sniffing stories, you’ve pretty much read 99% of them.

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