Austin Sound

In our latest roundup of local shortstacks, we check in on three new bands who are offering up their debut EP’s, and get a taste of the latest work from on old Austin favorite. Spoon’s surprise announcement last week that they would be dropping a new EP called Got Nuffin’ apparently caught their spell checkers once more by surprise as well, but hey, we know the feeling. The three tunes aren’t much to chew on, but we reckon at least it’s sumpin’. Meanwhile, new group Literature, which features some guitar work by Kevin Adickes of Austin Sound favorites Moth! Fight! (where have those guys gone?), throw out their debut. Though more of a demo than official release, there are some good sparks ignited in the rough production. And just because you can’t have Literature without The Authors (no matter what Barthes says), we take on their eponymous debut, which seems to go high on the production end, but falters on originality. Also on tap in our roundup, new quartet Your Kisses Cause Crashes get caught in the headlights.

Spoon – Got Nuffin’ (Merge)

Spoon unloaded a little summer surprise for fans in the form of their new Got Nuffin’ EP, a three song burst to bolster fans until the release of their next album. While there are plenty of fans out there that will eat up the EP, aside from the title track, there’s not all that much to get excited about. “Got Nuffin’” feels like classic Spoon from the start, kicking off with Jim Eno’s distinctive pummeling pulse on the drums, and cut with a blunt guitar line. Britt Daniel’s scratched pop vocals scrape along the surface, breaking for a few guitar thrills, between his declaration on the chorus of “I got nuffin’ to lose but darkness and shadows, Got nuffin to lose but loneliness and patterns.” His delivery is simultaneously unnerved and excited at the realization, which gives the song a good edge. Unfortunately, the EP’s appeal pretty much ends there. “Tweakers” is a hollowed out instrumental bit of wankery that sounds like some stuff they scraped off the studio floor to offer some insight into their process, basically a percussive loop that layers on raw keys and distortion in a seemingly pointless manner. It would be cool if this develops into a full song somewhere down the line, but as it is, the tune doesn’t even pass muster as interesting. As it drifts into closer “Stroke Their Brains,” the experiments began to flair in the vein of Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga. It’s bit ragged and garagey, filled with eerie ambient tones underneath the beat and hard strummed guitar, while Daniel’s voice floats back in forth in the mix, diving into reverb and self-harmonies.
- Doug Freeman

Websites:
www.spoontheband.com
Myspace

Literature – Literature (SR)

Literature’s credentials are pretty impeccable, almost a Natrix Natrix supergroup. Fronted by Nathan Cardaci, with Moth! Fight!’s Kevin Adickes, Natrix founder Seth Whaland, and Ghost Night’s Steven Garcia contributing to the quintet, the band comes off as a rugged mix of the Modern Lovers and Gang of Four with a nice pop aftertaste. While the recording is somewhat rough, the infectious punch of the songs still comes through, especially on the jaunty lilt of “Lily as an Afterthought.” Opener “Apples” slowly builds up from dual guitars to Cardaci’s lazily monotoned and buried vocals drawling, “Get ready, get able, we’re gonna get signed to a bigger label, one that knows just what we mean.” It’s an hilarious and catchy tune, mostly because of the discrepancy between the ambitious sentiments and laconic, enervated vocals. Live, Cardaci leads the band with a jittery, schizophrenic energy, which fits these tunes well, especially the cut between his shouted, unraveling yelps on the post-punky “The Prime Meridian” and the smooth accompanying arrangement. Closer “Grifted” is a bit more accessible, though the recording drowns and roughs up Cardaci’s vocals too much. While Cardaci figures out how best to deliver his singing style, however, he can rest assured his band is unloading some fantastically catchy music behind him, making Literature worth keeping an eye and ear on as they continue to pull it together.
- Doug Freeman

Websites:
Myspace

The Authors – The Authors (SR)

It’s odd to knock a debut for being too polished, but that’s the case for much of the Authors’ eponymous first EP. The quartet largely seems to drift in the wake of early-2000’s New York bands with a kind of innocuous re-waxing of guitar-based new wave. That’s not to say their tunes are bad, just that they largely lack an edge to cling onto. At their best, there are touches of the National and Spoon, but these are rare glimpes. Opener “Lions” sounds like the Police behind Justin Prater’s crooning, while “Tonight” drives down into more subdued and moodier dark-wave territory. The hypnotically repetitive guitar gives away the NYC influence, which spikes completely to the fore in the indie-dance pulse of “Put It On” as it jumps from Spoon-sque to a chorus ripped from the Strokes or Hot Hot Heat. Closer “Dig a Hole” follows the same guitar formula, but sped up into a frenzy that bounces off of Prater’s alternating elongated and staccotoed singing. The Authors are big on bridges, and nearly every song seems to want to fight itself for how it should unfold – if the album were a bit more raw, this could produce some interesting tension, but as precisely produced as the EP is, it often sounds more like the band trying to do too much and be too clever with songs that aren’t exciting or strong enough to support those kinds of movements. That being said, however, if the Authors can home in on their direction, they certainly seem to have the talent and ambition to produce something that sticks.
- Doug Freeman

Websites:
Myspace

Your Kisses Cause Crashes – Deer in Headlights (SR)

I have a love/hate relationship with Deer in Headlights. Upon the first listen, I honestly hated it: I thought it was cliché, typical indie pop that I’ve heard many times before. Upon repeated listens, certain elements of the quartet’s debut started to grow on me, and although I can appreciate what Your Kisses Cause Crashes is offering, there are still some issues with the five-song EP that leave a lot to be desired. Most objectionable is the over-bearing melody synthesizers driven to the point where it becomes distracting, especially at moments when the vocals are drowned out by the keyboards. Andy Kaminski’s vocals rings like a higher pitched Ben Gibbard, especially on the way that “You Suffer Egos” blends his voice smoothly into the various melodies. On paper, all the different melodies in one song looks like a recipe for disaster, but Your Kisses Cause Crashes executes the combination effortlessly on this track, but that’s the pinnacle of the EP. For now, if Your Kisses Cause Crashes seek recognition within or even beyond the saturated Austin music scene, they are going to need to dig a little deeper in their creativity and fine-tune their writing style to give them more than just a clever band name.
- Sarah Vasquez

Websites:
Myspace