This is my last Delicious Berries post, using bands from MusicalFamilyTree.com‘s Indiana indie compilation, and this one might be my favorite. Winechuggers have an easy-going rock feel, like all the Pavement or Sebadoh songs I realy like and none of the ones that I can’t stand. Good stuff, and on the MFT site there are about 100 songs from Winechuggers to sift through — “Long Circuitous Path” is just a little piece of candy. Thanks to Jeb Banner for putting together the site, the compilation, and for playing along in this bands as well. Good luck, Indiana!
So Many Dynamos
Finally! I’ve been sitting on So Many Dynamos for a little while now, trying to wait for their new album before posting about them. These St. Louis fellas have recently spent time as Emperor X’s backing band and extensively touring themselves. All that time on the road and all the shows have helped them find, focus, and refine themselves. The goal: to make you dance. The result: crashing drums, frantic vocals, equally frantic guitars, a horn section, a 30 member choir, carnival instruments, and lots of dancing in the living room.
Hot One
All the Catholics who thought The DaVinci Code was an assault on their religion might as well not even bother with Hot One. The opening track on their self-titled album, “Get Your Priest On!”, doesn’t present the clergy in a particularly flattering light. Social and religious conservatives, war hawks and politicians, parents, the timid and shy — none of these groups really fit the Hot One focus group of vulgar, disgusted and distracted fans of filthy glam rock, with a sarcastic political bent. I was blasting the disc while driving with all the windows down in my Saturn Vue recently, and it felt so right to be so wrong.
Lemonheads
(With all the excitement of Steve Martin in The Jerk upon discovering his new phonebooks…) The new Lemonheads is here! The new Lemonheads is here! My goose has been all up in a gander anticipating the new album. Evan Dando recorded it with reigning punk rock producer Bill Stevenson of The Descendents working the boards (and drums). J. Mascis’ guitar geniusly underscores this track. I know Lemonheads fans were hoping for a return to form. Sounds like they got it…
Red Bennies
It appears the Red Bennies couldn’t care less. Their website lists shows from back in April. The only trace of live shows on their myspace page are from comments of other bands, posting flyers for recent shows. What gives? Where y’all at? Would somebody from Salt Lake check in and give us an update? Pretty please. I was slimming down my music collection and came across a couple albums I picked up back from my time in their town. They’ve veered away from their thick, noisy, gain-up-hot, Helmet from hell sound (“Provo Cries” and “Tyler”) and honed in on their lo-fi rock ‘n’ roll soul (“I’m Coming Home” & Shake It Off”). Soul-Fi if you will. To put them in a 3hive context for you, they’d align nicely with Cold War Kid’s improvisational reach for rock’s primacy, and Midlake’s recent take on nostalgia but leaning past the 70s to rough up Smokey Robinson a tad. And no, the Red Bennies were NOT thinned from my collection.
Hands Down Eugene
Hailing from Nashville, uh Indiana, Hands Down Eugene is yet another of the fine acts featured on Delicious Berries, MusicalFamilyTree.com‘s cool compilation of Hoosier bands. MFT had the entire Hands Down Eugene EP Full Blast available for free download, so here it is. With a rotating cast of musicians and a little weirdness thrown into the pop-rock mix, there’s probably something here for everyone.
The Autumn Project
No, summer ain’t over, but the kids are back in school, which means it’s essentially autumn. Des Moines, Iowa’s The Autumn Project and their post-rock sounds, then, provide us with our first assignment of the school year. Their 2003 LP Fable is a case study in the genre, full of monsterous guitar soundscapes and crashing cymbals. Their latest A Burning Light is darker and more focused, as demonstrated by doing a little compare and contrast between “Of Memorium” from Fable and the newer “Between the Smoke & Mirrors.” Five paragraphs, double-spaced. Due tomorrow.
Bel Auburn
Bel Auburn is a quintet from Ashland, an idyllic Ohio town some distance southwest of Cleveland. I say idyllic despite never having been there because the sweeping soundscapes that Bel Auburn have created are anything but ugly and uninspiring. In fact, these tracks, all from the band’s second self-released LP, Lullabies in A & C, are about as anthemic, emotive, and polished as you’ll find from a group of friends living off the cultural grid. It’s reminiscent of Coldplay or early Jimmy Eat World, the latter of which Bel Auburn claim as an influence. The lyrics can drift into codes known only by their author, but once a warm blast of guitar kicks in and Matt the lead singer lets go with a cathartic chorus, you’ll know exactly what Bel Auburn mean even if you have no clue what they’re talking about.
(Selected tracks are linked below; visit the Bel Auburn Website to download the rest of the album.)
North Valley Subconscious Orchestra
Medicine played in Memphis right before I got home from college one summer, but my brother Josh and our friend Andy saw them and even visited with them at the Admiral Benbow Inn (just recently demolished). They learned that Medicine’s wicked guitar feedback was achieved by running Brad Laner’s guitar through a four track and turning all the knobs up. We spent that whole summer trying to get a four track to mimic a distortion pedal with no success. Brad Laner, we determined, was a genius. Which is probably why I recently Tivo-ed the movie “The Crow,” just so I could see that scene of Medicine playing “Time Baby,” trying to get a glimpse of his guitar setup. Now Laner and fellow guitarist Christopher Willits, as North Valley Subconscious Orchestra, are releasing another feast of guitars on Ghostly’s digital download-only album The Right Kind of Nothing. More melodic feedback, anyone?
Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s
MusicalFamilyTree.com, a website dedicated to spreading the word about and sharing the music of Indiana bands, recently released the Delicious Berries compilation, and it is awesome. Fresh voices, ambitious sounds — I wish someone here in Michigan would tap into our local talent the way the MFT folks have. For my weekly posts in August, I’ll be featuring bands from the compilation, because it really is that good. The first, Margot and the Nuclear So and So’s, starts the disc, and with its deal on Artemis is likely one of the most commercially successful of the bands on Delicious Berries. The tracks below, full of quiet harmonies and pop hooks, are taken from their 2005 album The Dust of Retreat.