1/10/2009

Court Tavern write up thingy

Hey,

So the Heart on a Stick Blog wrote up a big thing about our Court Tavern show w/ the Vivian Girls and Mirrors and Wires. But its not just a show review. It also reviews both of our full lengths and attempts to build a bridge between those efforts. I am really impressed with it! Though I wouldn't agree with everything s/he had to say I think it is amazingly well thought out and, for the most part, accurate. I'm totally flattered that someone would take the time to think about us in this way. Its kinda long so I only pasted the beginning here. The link has the whole thing. - jarrettD
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FULL STORY

"S.W.A.T. Teams Are Pretty Cool" (Screaming Females/Vivian Girls, Court Tavern (New Brunswick NJ), 1-04-09)

So, some things to get excited about: I finally hauled off to see Screaming Females (myspace), of whom I've spoken before, whose What If Someone Is Watching Their T.V.? is one of those really good underheard albums, a great grower that a concerned cult will keep clutched to their chests. I picked up the band's first, 2006's Baby Teeth, which has some quality stuff, but is mostly important because in the gap between Album One and Album Two you can hear a band figuring out not only what it can do (Marissa Paternoster could always shred, may have been born doing just that), but what it wants to do. I learned that Album Three, Power Move, is coming out in April on Don Giovanni.
Screaming Females - Baby Jesus (mp3)(buy Baby Teeth)
"Screaming Females" is an appealingly blunt name, and "Boyfriend" - the screamiest, most direct punk song on T.V. - is still my best-favorite of theirs. But there's enough misdirection in their craft that even some of their obvious strengths - their tunefulness, for instance - come off as surprising. How very feminine.
"Jesus" is the final track on Baby Teeth, and - though for all I know it was the first thing they ever recorded - it sort of hints about what they'd go on and get great at: That chorus, holy fuck, it could be this soaring thing, the sort that could weather reprises ad infinitum. But it's verbally punched at and kept wanting-more short. Naturally melodic, they use attack and arrangement to de-emphasize the melody; sometimes that's as easy as having Paternoster warble the tune under her jacked-up guitar riffs and fills. T.V. is noisier and, in a lot of ways, sparer than Teeth, which can make a lot of it sound very simple. Some of what they do is seeing how little they can get away with, some of what they do is seeing how much they can get away with, some of what they do is just getting away - but they make everything feel like it belongs right where it lands. Most songs, maybe every song, features a guitar solo. And that's a positive, because it's often something left-field unexpected, frantic runs or staid bluesy stuff or NOISE or something simple and light and pretty, and always, always brief. The band follows all sorts of urges but never lets them go on long enough to lose focus; that way, they feel like ideas, not indulgences.
(Even easier to overlook, the writing is good. Along with rousing repetitive chants like "You are always talking and you never stop!" ("Theme Song") and "I will tear the heads of this culture, make my presence known!" ("Pedro"), choice lines range from simple smarts ("See all these dinosaurs? They want to rule the world." ("Dinosaurs")) to messy poetry ("Like a showgirl in a fugue of childbirth" ("Starve the Beat")).)
(((((etc);)),)).).

Continued HERE

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