In the midst of the Sprawl news, I shouldn't neglect to mention that my VOTS team has won four ina row to pull even on the season. You'll remember we were in dire straits after losing badly to the other division's last place team; we followed that with a win against their #1 team (Vince's Town Tricycle) and a wind-aided upset against Justin D.'s 3rd-ranked May Cause Dizziness. We followed that by fairly shellacking Keith's Inglourius Backhanderds and the number one seed from our division, BP, Paul & J-Ro's The Pen is Mightier. (I will leave detailed boasting aside, but with an injured Heart Attack, Nipar and a sporadically appearing Hoyt, I would claim that I deserve some sort of Andre Dawson-esque MVP. After all, I scored or threw a full 13/14ths of our team's goals in the most recent game ;)). That took us from the pit of despair to 5-5 on the season (and a +4 point differential), earning us the 6th seed on our side and an 11th overall ranking (based on the dubious Nabity all-league rankings). So in pool play (which starts this week), we've got a rematch with May Cause Dizziness, a new match in EBay's Jelly it Up the Sideline, and another new match in Disc-throw Inferno. Realistically, we should lose to MCD on Tuesday and be eliminated from real contention, but we'll see how it goes. I doubt I can pull off the same level of mayhem that I've been doing (taking next to no subs, cutting like crazy) for a full day of Ultimate on Saturday anyways.
Saturday morning scrimmages have been revived, now called the "Elizabeth Lambert Scrimmage-for-Lunch Ultimate Gauntlet" or EL-SLUG. (If you don't know who EL is, might I direct you HERE). My team lost a heart-breaker Saturday; on Universe-for-lunch point, JD threw a laser huck up the sideline, I laid out over / through Rob for the game-winner ... and couldn't get it. To be fair, he grabbed my arm right as I reached for the disc, but it would have been an utterly lame foul call given that 1, I laid out into him, and 2, it was double Ultimate point. We did get another turnover for a final shot at the OT victory, but Tom "A full two thirds of our overtime turnovers" V. gacked an easy disc at midfield to choke away the game. Ah, well, it happens. I hate buying lunch for people, but it would have been arbitrary either way. The two actual games went 13-7 / 8-13, so everything was balanced. I played okay on the day with some nice stuff here and there, a little over-adventurous with some throws to some of our "know your receiver" targets, but otherwise okay. I did have a nice layout grab for a goal and a goalline handblock, always fun. I'm generally disappointed that we can't get a *real* men's competitive scrimmage going - where the hell were all our handlers this weekend? - but hopefully that will get corrected once we get closer to NYF.
Alright, more on the non-Ultimate front later. I have a crazy school-week coming up, but nothing I can't storm my way through. And now, I have to go run a beginner's clinic.
11.15.2009
AR: Wake of the Flood
Grateful Dead - Wake of the Flood (1973)
Most notable for being a cherished member of the Nyet Jones CD-Amp Series*, the Grateful Dead's 6th studio album (and the fourth GD album I bought) is a first step in the jazzier direction that the mid-'70s Dead would take. These tunes, more than most GD songs, are cited as being better in their same-era live incantations than these studio versions, primarily because (predictably) the concert medium allowed for much spacier, exploratory takes. That's fairly undeniable, but this set of studio takes does reveal some of the controlled, full ensemble intricacy the band was capable of - they are less adventurous, but hardly sterile.
* - It was a pretty big deal when, as a teenaged youth, I saved up enough money to get a nice six CD magazine Pioneer CD player for my bedroom. Of course, I didn't have money for a tuner/ receiver or speakers, so unless I was listening to my CD Player on headphones - inconvenient for, when example, taking a post-football-practice-exhausted bath - I had to run a guitar patch cable from the CD player headphone jack to my guitar amp. (Have I mentioned this before? Probably. Oh, well). You may or may not know that while both the player and the guitar amp use a 1/4" plug, the CD player's is a stereo plug while the guitar amp's end is mono. So you can really only get one of the channels to play through a guitar amp with the set-up I was using. 90% of the time this doesn't matter a whole lot, as most stereo albums have a significant amount of bleed from left to right channels - i.e., the stereo divisions aren't strict - so the whole sound comes through a mono speaker anyways. But there are elements that only come across in one channel, and so a few albums in my formative youth were encoded as missing particular elements. Even today, when I hear them now, it's striking to hear this brand new melody line or what have you. For Wake, it was the opening sax line from "Let Me Sing Your Blues Away" - the sax was absent, so all I would hear were these odd, popping guitar vamp chords. The sax came in later in the song, which is really weird - why would you start in just the left channel and then move it later? - but I swear that's how it sounded. Other albums in the series were Led Zepellin III, Southern Harmony and Musical Companion, and DSOTM. There were more, I'm sure, but those are the ones I think of when I think of the complete absence of certain instruments. Please be aware that I will probably repeat this story when I get to those albums, too.
"Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodleoo" opens the album with a laid-back, fiddle-led groove backed by some excellent lead guitar lines and old time piano-tinkling. I love the lyrics of this one, too; "What's the point to calling shots? / This cue ain't straight in line..." and the opening Cain & Abel nods just beg for sing-alongs. At about the 4:00 mark, the song drops into a summer-breeze bridge that carries out to fade out. This opener is just SF cool, a marked departure from the folk-dominated tone of the previous albums. This vibe continues with the sax-led rocker "Let Me Sing Your Blues Away" (also featuring the signature back-up vocals of Donna Jean Godchaux) and the super slowed-down Garcia crooned cool classic ballad, "Row Jimmy." For lack of better adjectives, the opening tunes of WotF largely sound like 1970s California: electric smooth, cares-away cool, and very smooth.
"Stella Blue" follows; if you don't know, this is one of those slow, religious experience Jerry Garcia ballads that "real" Deadheads live for. I've always thought this tune functions in concert as a huge come down from gigantic jams, so placing it here on the album (after "Row Jimmy") seems like an odd choice. This version is quite lovely but probably exhibit 1a for arguments for the Dead's superiority in concert; this is plenty gripping and pretty, but for whatever reason it does not carry the same emotional depth as a solid in concert version. Dgmw, still a solid version and makes for a sit down and think section to the middle of the album; just doesn't have all the power I associate with the tune; the concert tapes have spoiled me.
Things pick up a little bit with the almost too-hippie "Here Come Sunshine," another mid tempo chill-tune with an adequately uplifting chorus. Really straightforward tune, actually - just VCVCVC with that nice, build-up chorus. This starts the segue into the jazzier side of the Dead; this whole album is removed in tone/genre from the Americana of Workingman's and American Beauty, but with "Eyes of the World" and (even moreso) "Weather Report Suite," things take an overt foray into more complex chords, intricate guitar runs, and odd time signature breakdowns. Something resembling jazz-rock. "EotW" maintains a certain pop sensibility / hookiness that would be *absolutely* perfected in the next album in "Franklin's Tower;" for now, you get another very good breezy number with some expert guitar runs and just enough sing-along / dance-along impetus to genuinely lilt. "WRS," on the other hand, is a 12:43 multi-passage opus. It opens with "Prelude," a classical guitar intro that gets backed by drums and an organ and slowly fades into the full band "Part 1", complete with an emotional, closed eye vocal that throughout the tune teeters on the overly dramatic. "Like a desert spring / My lover comes and spreads her wings" are typical, and I guess if you're in the mood for such romanticism it's fine. The vocals are well blended (kudos, again, to Donna); that is one advantage of this version over some concert flubs. "Part 2: Let it Grow" is a progressive accelerando that stays on the melodramatic but matches it with tense music; this eventually fades into a horns-tinged jam that runs to a final vocal section ("What shall we say / Shall we call it by a name?") that brings the extended composition to a fine close. It's probably easy to figure this out, but "Part 2" is the bit that often gets run out into the ether in concert, i.e. where Grateful Dead "magic" happens. So such an abbreviated segment in light of the other versions always sounds a bit odd.
So there are a couple of things working against this disc. One, as noted, there are better versions out there of a lot of these songs, so there's a pervasive sense that even though these tunes are not sterile per se, they are not as lively as one knows they can be. Two, it's a bit too clean / laid-back for its own good. I happen to love this disc as one of my nostalgic Dead collections, but I can definitely see how people might think some of these tunes are a little plain and/or steering in a smooth-jazz sort of direction. I'd be hesitant, for example, to introduce someone to the GD with this disc, unless I already knew they were really into jazz-rock (in which case, Blues for Allah would be a better choice besides).
Still, this disc is a personal love and well worth your time. The opening track is a killer, and the rest is great for a can't care sunset / beer combination. A qualified yes for this one, and that qualification is that you be in the appropriate low-energy mood for soul-soothing.
(Addendum: Dick's Picks Vol. 1 contains about half of this album in a show from December 1973, if you want to see what I mean about the vivacity of the live performances).
Status: Recommended (solid)
Nyet's Fave: "Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodleoo"
The Crying of Parking Lot Lines
Oh, Scottsdale, you inconvenient slut, you.
Last night, Beck and I trekked over to L.A. Minor to see the "Ultimate Green Scene," an open house event at "the mixed-use, luxury residential project, the Optima Camelview Village." It's a huge, flora-smothered complex smack in the middle of Snotsdale featuring over-the-top amenities, 1.4 million dollar condos, etc. For all the lushness (luxury- and plant-wise), they entirely failed to explain what was green about the place. Ah, well. Xtina had helped out with one of the art exhibits and sent us an e-mail about the event, but due to some miscommunications over text, phone and e-mail, we went down there at 4 instead of the 6:30 she had planned on. Beck got cold* and hungry, so we got back in the car and looked around Collagenland for a place to eat. We settled on Stax, a burger joint. Our troubles started in the parking lot.
* - B: "I'm cold!" N: "Here, take my sweater; I've got a long sleeve shirt on underneath." B: "No." N: "Why not?" B: "I'm fine with complaining." N: "HRC**! HRC!"
** - neologism courtesy of iPMeghan. It stands for "Help-rejecting Complainer," an apparent frequent feature of humans everywhere.
Beck parked her itty bitty and thoroughly plastic Prius *slightly* to the right of center in a parking spot at the end of a row. I got out of the passenger's side, opening the door slowly and sliding out so as not to touch the car next to us. We started walking to Stax when behind us, a loud, shrill voice announced to the night:
"I really hope you didn't door my jeep!!!"
We all but ignored the voice, primarily not realizing that it was directed at me but also subconsciously, I am sure, refusing to recognize the use of "door" as a verb*. Unsatisfied, the wobbly an utterly Slutsdale-clad lady repeated her invective:
"I REALLY HOPE YOU DIDN'T DOOR MY JEEP SINCE YOU PARKED SO CLOSE TO IT."
* - In drunk skank's defense**, I realized I have used the word "door" as a verb, too, but only in the passive construction. It refers to when you are biking in Boston along the right side of the lane and a parked car's driver opens his driver's side door to exit as you pass; the proper construction is "I got doored on the way to work this morning," and every biker in the world will know what you mean. Just for the record, the proper response to getting doored - should you anticipate the action in time - is not to slam your brakes but to deliver a 20 mph forearm shiver to the driver in question. This, hopefully, will serve as Pavlovian reminder the next time they decide to exit their car on a busy street without checking the traffic behind them.
** - Or, as Beck noted this morning, "You can verb anything."
Okay, she got our attention. She was a typical Scottsdolt specimen, free to yell anything as passers by on account of her beefcake date (who, to his credit, ignored this exchange entirely). Beck politely responded, "What!!?!?" and the lady continued yelling, "You parked way close to it and he got out so slowly, I'm just warning you better not have doored my jeep." Flabbergasting, and I especially like the suspicion based on the fact that I had done the appropriate thing and exited the car carefully. WTF, crazy lady. Beck had slowly unholstered the Iron Fist and was about to discharge her God-given right to bear arms when I pulled her away and said, "Don't worry, your car is fine." Eskiho slams her door shut; Beck watched them pull out to make sure they didn't do something stupid to our car. Just an idiotic exchange, and as Beck noted, it's bizarre when you're traipsing around the earth assuming people are going to be decent and they just open up on such unfounded, hostile notes. So thanks for putting a senseless damper on our evening, moron; really appreciate it. Maybe next time you can actually check for a scratch on your car before demonstrating your esteemed IQ to the public.
And many, many apologies for exiting my car carefully. How DARE I!
Last night, Beck and I trekked over to L.A. Minor to see the "Ultimate Green Scene," an open house event at "the mixed-use, luxury residential project, the Optima Camelview Village." It's a huge, flora-smothered complex smack in the middle of Snotsdale featuring over-the-top amenities, 1.4 million dollar condos, etc. For all the lushness (luxury- and plant-wise), they entirely failed to explain what was green about the place. Ah, well. Xtina had helped out with one of the art exhibits and sent us an e-mail about the event, but due to some miscommunications over text, phone and e-mail, we went down there at 4 instead of the 6:30 she had planned on. Beck got cold* and hungry, so we got back in the car and looked around Collagenland for a place to eat. We settled on Stax, a burger joint. Our troubles started in the parking lot.
* - B: "I'm cold!" N: "Here, take my sweater; I've got a long sleeve shirt on underneath." B: "No." N: "Why not?" B: "I'm fine with complaining." N: "HRC**! HRC!"
** - neologism courtesy of iPMeghan. It stands for "Help-rejecting Complainer," an apparent frequent feature of humans everywhere.
Beck parked her itty bitty and thoroughly plastic Prius *slightly* to the right of center in a parking spot at the end of a row. I got out of the passenger's side, opening the door slowly and sliding out so as not to touch the car next to us. We started walking to Stax when behind us, a loud, shrill voice announced to the night:
"I really hope you didn't door my jeep!!!"
We all but ignored the voice, primarily not realizing that it was directed at me but also subconsciously, I am sure, refusing to recognize the use of "door" as a verb*. Unsatisfied, the wobbly an utterly Slutsdale-clad lady repeated her invective:
"I REALLY HOPE YOU DIDN'T DOOR MY JEEP SINCE YOU PARKED SO CLOSE TO IT."
* - In drunk skank's defense**, I realized I have used the word "door" as a verb, too, but only in the passive construction. It refers to when you are biking in Boston along the right side of the lane and a parked car's driver opens his driver's side door to exit as you pass; the proper construction is "I got doored on the way to work this morning," and every biker in the world will know what you mean. Just for the record, the proper response to getting doored - should you anticipate the action in time - is not to slam your brakes but to deliver a 20 mph forearm shiver to the driver in question. This, hopefully, will serve as Pavlovian reminder the next time they decide to exit their car on a busy street without checking the traffic behind them.
** - Or, as Beck noted this morning, "You can verb anything."
Okay, she got our attention. She was a typical Scottsdolt specimen, free to yell anything as passers by on account of her beefcake date (who, to his credit, ignored this exchange entirely). Beck politely responded, "What!!?!?" and the lady continued yelling, "You parked way close to it and he got out so slowly, I'm just warning you better not have doored my jeep." Flabbergasting, and I especially like the suspicion based on the fact that I had done the appropriate thing and exited the car carefully. WTF, crazy lady. Beck had slowly unholstered the Iron Fist and was about to discharge her God-given right to bear arms when I pulled her away and said, "Don't worry, your car is fine." Eskiho slams her door shut; Beck watched them pull out to make sure they didn't do something stupid to our car. Just an idiotic exchange, and as Beck noted, it's bizarre when you're traipsing around the earth assuming people are going to be decent and they just open up on such unfounded, hostile notes. So thanks for putting a senseless damper on our evening, moron; really appreciate it. Maybe next time you can actually check for a scratch on your car before demonstrating your esteemed IQ to the public.
And many, many apologies for exiting my car carefully. How DARE I!
Paving the World
Big, fat, life-altering news from the Ultimate front: BP and Gries stepped down from captaining duties for Sprawl, leaving a void in 2010 Sprawl leadership. Six people were nominated, four declined; two had talked previously about captaining together, were psyched to combine their complementary talents, and accepted. The 2010 crew of World Pavers, aka the Metro-Phoenix men's club team Sprawl, will be captained by Justin "Neon Deion" Dheintime and your very own Nyet "the Lesser" Jones. Tres exciting!
Dheintime, aka Trigger, is the same Justin who was a raging tour de force on your favorite VOTS team EVAH and mine, The Royal WEfnuk*. He's one of the faster human beings I've had the privilege of being burned by. I am pretty sure one of the reasons he stays so young is the time he spends near light speeds. I know, I slay you. But JD is standout kinds of quick with incredible endurance. Add to that some killer instincts and an already thorougly developed knowledge of the game. Primo mid-receiver and defender, the kind of guy other teams watch score multiple times at regionals and ask, "He has to get tired eventually, right?" No, no he does not. I feel I've already mentioned that on these pages, but you get the point: fantastic player, and youthful; at 26, he's not even at his peak yet. It's difficult to imagine him getting quicker, but in the short year-plus I've known him, his jumping, reading, throws that were already good have gotten better. Sky's the limit - *literally*:
All of which is to point out that we are balanced as players - he's young, fast, athletic and has hops, and I, er, balance that. No, seriously, I've morphed into the aged handler prototype for club frisbee purposes, so it's good to have that end of things (handler cuts, dumps, disc control, strategies, etc.) in my domain while the other aspects of the game (athleticism, man D, open field cutting, troop-inspiring) in his. If we had a third guy who was a big imposing deep threat, we'd be a perfect trio. Oh, wait - what's that you say? Gries and Vince (and... Cole?) are giant athletic deeps who will fill that role by wearing the proverbial As on their jerseys and being auxiliary captains? Why, it almost sounds like we have bases covered.
Most importantly, Triggs is the nice-guy Midwestern ying to my nasty Texas-via-East-Coast yang. Not to put either of us in any stereotypical holes - DT is certainly not going to put up with anyone's crap in any kind of aw-shucks way, even if he does have the boyish charm to panty-drop many an unsuspecting waitress. But he is by nature more positive than I am. I think we'll present a balanced front to the TEAM, be able to figure out which players respond to whom better, as well as keep one another in check. We are, you might say, like a spectrum, or two sides of a coin.
I've probably guffawed enough and made my point, but suffice it - Dheintime's an awesome guy, awesome player, and brings a lot to the table that I don't; I hope the reverse is true. We are intensely invested in the upcoming year - Sprawl made a leap this past year, and all indications are that with some good recruiting, some tweaking here and there, and some dedication from the team, we can take the great situation that BP/Griesy created and punch it up another DFW-ian plateau. I've got one or two legit years left as a club player before I make the "leap" to the Masters division, and I really hope I can a, hold together, and b, use the past 13 years of club experience to drive this team up. More news obviously to follow - I know this blog was lacking in Ultimate posts - but for now, let's leave it that my brain overfloweth with ideas. First step is recruiting some dudes...
*We are actually running up on the one year anniversary of that team's shocking and dominant Fall League Championship, so now would be as good of a time as any to reminisce on that juggernaut. 9-1, +59 points, +5.9 ppg in the regular season. We lost our opener to Offshore Swilling 15-8 (without Justin, not coincidentally), meaning that +/- was actually +66 for the nine victories, or +7.33 per game... yikes. We ran off 14 games in a row from that point, also going 5-0, +33 in the playoffs, including a crushing 15-6 revenge victory on OS in the finals. Memories... it is highly unlikely that Justin and I will ever get to play together on a league team again (or Pat and I, or Genevieve and I, etc.), so here's a repeat of a great picture of a great team:
Dheintime, aka Trigger, is the same Justin who was a raging tour de force on your favorite VOTS team EVAH and mine, The Royal WEfnuk*. He's one of the faster human beings I've had the privilege of being burned by. I am pretty sure one of the reasons he stays so young is the time he spends near light speeds. I know, I slay you. But JD is standout kinds of quick with incredible endurance. Add to that some killer instincts and an already thorougly developed knowledge of the game. Primo mid-receiver and defender, the kind of guy other teams watch score multiple times at regionals and ask, "He has to get tired eventually, right?" No, no he does not. I feel I've already mentioned that on these pages, but you get the point: fantastic player, and youthful; at 26, he's not even at his peak yet. It's difficult to imagine him getting quicker, but in the short year-plus I've known him, his jumping, reading, throws that were already good have gotten better. Sky's the limit - *literally*:
All of which is to point out that we are balanced as players - he's young, fast, athletic and has hops, and I, er, balance that. No, seriously, I've morphed into the aged handler prototype for club frisbee purposes, so it's good to have that end of things (handler cuts, dumps, disc control, strategies, etc.) in my domain while the other aspects of the game (athleticism, man D, open field cutting, troop-inspiring) in his. If we had a third guy who was a big imposing deep threat, we'd be a perfect trio. Oh, wait - what's that you say? Gries and Vince (and... Cole?) are giant athletic deeps who will fill that role by wearing the proverbial As on their jerseys and being auxiliary captains? Why, it almost sounds like we have bases covered.
Most importantly, Triggs is the nice-guy Midwestern ying to my nasty Texas-via-East-Coast yang. Not to put either of us in any stereotypical holes - DT is certainly not going to put up with anyone's crap in any kind of aw-shucks way, even if he does have the boyish charm to panty-drop many an unsuspecting waitress. But he is by nature more positive than I am. I think we'll present a balanced front to the TEAM, be able to figure out which players respond to whom better, as well as keep one another in check. We are, you might say, like a spectrum, or two sides of a coin.
I've probably guffawed enough and made my point, but suffice it - Dheintime's an awesome guy, awesome player, and brings a lot to the table that I don't; I hope the reverse is true. We are intensely invested in the upcoming year - Sprawl made a leap this past year, and all indications are that with some good recruiting, some tweaking here and there, and some dedication from the team, we can take the great situation that BP/Griesy created and punch it up another DFW-ian plateau. I've got one or two legit years left as a club player before I make the "leap" to the Masters division, and I really hope I can a, hold together, and b, use the past 13 years of club experience to drive this team up. More news obviously to follow - I know this blog was lacking in Ultimate posts - but for now, let's leave it that my brain overfloweth with ideas. First step is recruiting some dudes...
*We are actually running up on the one year anniversary of that team's shocking and dominant Fall League Championship, so now would be as good of a time as any to reminisce on that juggernaut. 9-1, +59 points, +5.9 ppg in the regular season. We lost our opener to Offshore Swilling 15-8 (without Justin, not coincidentally), meaning that +/- was actually +66 for the nine victories, or +7.33 per game... yikes. We ran off 14 games in a row from that point, also going 5-0, +33 in the playoffs, including a crushing 15-6 revenge victory on OS in the finals. Memories... it is highly unlikely that Justin and I will ever get to play together on a league team again (or Pat and I, or Genevieve and I, etc.), so here's a repeat of a great picture of a great team:
11.13.2009
AR: Vampire Weekend
Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend (2008)
As trendy in the late 2000s as, well, vampires, NYC-based Vampire Weekend erupted on the indie pop scene in 2007 / 2008 and, um, the hipsters didn't stand a chance. It will save a lot of effort just to list their utterly true list of oft-made-association words, so here goes: afro-pop, preppy, effortless, chamber-pop, ivy league, Paul Simon's Graceland, baroque, erudite, nonsense lyrics, clean, catchy, catchy, CATCHY. Beck, D/C and I were lucky enough to catch these guys in Tempe last year where they were kind enough to play their album in mixed up order (plus maybe one non-debut album song) for us. Amazingly, this is one of the few times when hearing a rather note-for-note take of an album in a live setting did not disappoint but entrenched the already head-entombed songs even deeper into my consciousness. Like I said, CATCHY - just ask the Beck, who keeps a copy of this CD in her car at all times (and puts it on the iPod whenever I ask her to DJ - given that VW is not an audiobook or NPR, this should be rather striking). Their live show brought a ton of energy, and since we were at the tail end of their US tour (on which I imagine they had played that exact set of tunes a hundred plus times), I was pretty impressed that they delivered such a gripping, memorable performance. Then again, they were not exactly lacking in the fawning female audience members department, so it's not like they lacked proper motivation.
VW impresses as an exceedingly immediate album; it reminds me a lot of The Strokes' debut in its first-listen memorability and quick, direct appeal. VW owns a clean sound - synths, strings, that trebly lead guitar, and the crisp drum/bass work all stand out brilliantly. They took their time crafting the album, and it paid off greatly - this is one of those "every note in place" efforts, and more importantly, there is nary a clunker tune to be found. In lieu of the usual track by track account of great albums, I'll just insist that you get a hold of this one and let it infect your brain, too. The only tune I don't just love on this disc is "One (Blake's Got a New Face") because of that shrill tagline; it's just too much afro and not enough chamber for my tastes. Everything else ranges from solid to great to excellent - I'm sure people differ greatly in their favorites, but given that I'm hooked on ten of eleven tracks, the ones that get me song-stuck the most are "Oxford Comma," "M79," and "The Kids Don't Stand a Chance." Even saying that is silly; there's not a one on here that doesn't transmit those uplifting essence-de-cool-breeze grins.
All of that praise deservedly heaped - something in the nonsense lyrics and the over-hookiness of this one paradoxically holds it down for me. Almost as if this were too easy - if they can just spit out these brain viruses with this afro-chamber-indie formula, then surely some experimentation could *really* kill. So that's both a very minor detractor for this disc and a selling point for the band - they absolutely owned this sound and crafted a debut package of gems; it'll be interesting to see what happens when they expand beyond this great but somewhat contained sound/style.
Status: Recommended
Nyet's Fave: "Oxford Comma"
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