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THE SILVER LINING: Reviews by Paul Silver

THE MORNING BENDERS – Talking Through Tin Cans (+1 Records, www.themorningbenders.com)

Sparkly, bouncy pop music with a slight British Invasion edge to it. The songs are very simple, straight forward pop numbers, and they’re fairly stripped down. This provides for an honest, sincere sound. This doesn’t mean that they’re raw – the production is first rate. But it isn’t overdone, so it doesn’t come off as too slick and fake. “Damnit Anna” opens the disk with an acoustic guitar and dual-tracked vocals, sounding a little bit like old Simon and Garfunkle. The third track, “Loose Change,” is a real stand-out, with its super simple melodic line and very sparse arrangement. “Wasted Time” and “Chasing a Ghost” are probably the heaviest tracks on the disk, sort of being two parts of one song, as one runs into the other. But “Chasing a Ghost” has the most intensity of all. In some ways the way it ends very quietly after all that intensity, especially the vocal stylings, remind me a bit of Chicago’s late Fire Show, one of my favorites. I’ve listened to this disc multiple times in writing this review, and I’m not getting bored with it at all – I appreciate it and like it more with each listen. This one gets a recommendation!


THE CHAPIN SISTERS – Lake Bottom
(www.plainrecordings.com)

This sort of reminds me of the Roches. They were also a trio, a sister act, were heavily folk-influenced, and featured rich harmonies. But, where the Roches were quirky and humorous, the Chapin Sisters are more serious and straight forward. They also have a much sparser sound, with a much thinner instrumental arrangement. It’s not what you would normally expect to see reviewed in Jersey Beat. It can’t, by any stretch o the imagination, be called punk rock or even rock. But it certainly is very enjoyable. I’m a sucker for multi-voice harmonization. I think my absolute favorite track on the album has to be “Girlfriend.” It has sort of a 50s or 60s doo-wop sort of undercurrent in both the sound and the lyrical content. It’s a song about a woman who thinks the guy she is addressing is the one for her, and she doesn’t like his girlfriend and wants her to go. In a way, with the strong bass line, the close harmonies, and the reverb on the guitar, it reminds me a little of the Angelo Badalamenti scoring in David Lynch’s Twin Peaks TV series, or in the film Blue Velvet. These ladies are very talented.


DIVE INDEX – Mid / Air (Neutral Music, www.neutralmusic.com)

This is sort of an arty-rocky-smooth jazzy-r&b sort of thing. It has elements of minimalism, a la Phillip Glass, with simple lines, repeating over and over. It has drum & bass sort of percussive elements contrasted with super smooth vocals. There’s lots of interesting layering and contrasting styles going on here. But, ultimately, the “smooth stylings” overwhelm the more interesting parts, giving the whole thing too much of an easy listening adult contemporary sound. It ends up sounding way more commercial than I think was the original intent. And thus, it fails in its quest.

 

THE HANDCUFFS – Model for a Revolution (OOFL Records, www.thehandcuffs.com)

Fairly standard stuff that sounds sort of indie but also sounds pretty commercial. It’s really slickly produced. It’s pretty much guitar/bass/drums/vocals pop music. I’ve listened through this a couple of times, hoping that it would grab me somehow, but it just doesn’t. It really does sound pretty ordinary and very commercial. I think a lot of it has to do with the production; it’s just way too slick. If they had gotten rid of all the cute studio tricks and left it a little more raw, it would probably sound a lot better, a lot more interesting. Sorry, I wanted to like this, but I just can’t. The musicians are very talented, and Chloe Orwell’s vocals are really powerful. But the songs just don’t cut it.

 

SKY CRIES MARY – Small Town (www.skycriesmary.com)

Well, I gave this a try. It’s swirly, overblown stuff. It’s very commercial sounding, and it was putting me to sleep. I wanted to like it, but it just sounded way too much like too many things I’ve heard on commercial radio and just didn’t get into. I like swirly stuff. The promo materials they sent with this compared the band to the likes of Spiritualized and My Bloody Valentine, both bands which I truly have enjoyed. This doesn’t sound anything like either of these worthy bands.


THE TROLLEYVOX
Your Secret Safe / Luzerne
(www.transitofvenusmusic.com)


The two titles there doesn’t indicate a single, they indicate a two-album release. No, not a double album, this is two albums packaged together in one release. Your Secret Safe is an electric album, while Luzerne is fully acoustic. Your Secret Safe features the full band with a full complement of pleasant indie-pop tunes. It’s not super bouncy or hyper, it’s very relaxed, laid-back, and lush. The bounciest it gets is, for example, on the track “Rabbit in the Sun”, which seems to glide more than hop, but that’s not bad. It’s one of my favorite tracks on the disc, reminding me a little bit of the late, lamented Tsunami. Beth Filla’s vocals are just georgeous. The second album, Luzerne, continues with more beautiful indie music, sounding much the same as on disc 1, but now all acoustic. Most of the tracks are very simple, with guitars and vocals. Some tracks also feature violin, some percussion, some with piano. All are beautiful, and, of course, feature those wonderful vocals from Filla. “Intermission,” halfway through the disc, is one of the stand-outs. This is nice stuff, and priced the same as a single disc, is a real bargain.

THE BLACK SWANS - Change! ( www.la-soc.com)

Imagine being on a raft, floating down a slow moving river on a hot, humid, hazy day. You have lots of time to think, brood, imagine. Now set your musings to quiet, delicate music, with acoustic guitar, violin, and electric guitar with plenty of reverb. The somewhat folksy, somewhat country feeling is what you get aplenty from this latest effort from the Black Swans. I must say, the Appalachian violin stylings of Noel Sayre is one of the best things about this album. The violin playing is not flashy, but adds the perfect plaintive atmosphere. I can’t quite say the same for Jerry DeCicca’s vocals, which are sort of like a flat Bob Dylan, without the nasal twang. His songs are nice enough, but I’m sorry, he’s the wrong person to be singing them. He can’t carry a tune and his voice sounds too heavy for the delicate melodies. I mean, the instrumentals are really beautiful, but those vocals sometimes get kind of distracting.

 

CHEYENNE – The Whale (www.cheyennesongs.net)

Well, after a pretty cool, bouncy, interesting opening title track, the rest seems to be reasonable decent, but ultimately forgettable background music. It’s all fairly mid-tempo stuff, laid back and relaxed, which can be nice. But ultimately, an entire album of the same stuff over and over tends to fade from one’s attention. Many of the songs have a country tinge, too, which doesn’t necessarily help. I do really like the title track, though, which is completely different from anything else on the album. But it’s not enough.

 

HIT AND MRS. – Buried in the Backyard of My Heart (www.thehitandmrs.com)

What is it these days with indie bands putting country twang into their otherwise decent indie rock? Hit and Mrs. alternately sound sort of like Social Distortion and Bob Dylan (it must be the harmonica on some of the tracks). But this band tries to at least vary things a bit here and there. “Burning Circles” is a pretty cool post-punk track that stands out as very different from anything else on the disc. Some of the tracks are just raw rock and roll, like “Graveyard Digger,” even down to the orgran, just like the old garage bands of the 60s. Sometimes the tracks sound a little too raw, like the band members really were just jamming, and hadn’t really rehearsed the songs too much, or the songs were never quite finished. I might also add that the lyrics tend to be very minimalist. Not that there’s little in the way of vocals, but the lyrics that are present tend to be repeated over and over and over. So, overall, while the sound is somewhat promising, Hit and Mrs. need to spend a little more time polishing their material.

SCARY KIDS SCARING KIDS (Immortal Records)

This is pretty bland “Alternative” rock such as you would hear on your local “alternative” radio station. It’s very slickly produced and has no redeeming values. It thinks it’s emo, and even includes a little bit of screaming. But it’s nothing more than hair-band music for the 21st century.

 

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