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Bear Claw – Bear Claw (Monofonus)
Part of a series of one-sided 10” vinyl releases that the always engaging Monofonus Press is releasing, Bear Claw’s official debut offering (earlier released on cassette) is a beautiful and bittersweet pop delight. The trio’s sound sits well in Austin’s indie pop scene, more subdued than many of their contemporaries, but also envelopingly charming without dipping into saccharine treatments. Their minimal approach serves the songs well, Nigel Rainey’s vocals lending a calmly daydreamed disenchantment atop the sparse backbeats and strums and melodica, a bit like a less dramatic young Morrissey. “Needle and Thorn” clips briskly in its lovelorn weariness, with the female harmonies continually adding an effervescent touch. Similarly, “Warm Winter” could easily play alongside locals like the Lovely Sparrows, especially as the chorus swells sadly into “I’ll be a shut-in, I’ll just stay home, Hope you’re here too, Hope I’m not alone.” “Romantic Period” jangles up behind an acoustic bop and sway, while the martial beat of closer “You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby Blue” strikes with a more deliberately bitter heart that even the melodica can’t soothe. An excellent four song set that begs for more.
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She Sir – Yens (SR)
In 2006, She Sir released their debut, Who Can’t Say Yes, a promising shot of heavy, intricate shoegaze that made them an instant local standout. Since that time, however, the band has kept a fairly low-profile, making a few lineup changes and adding sporadic live shows. Yens is their welcome return, four songs that build on that glistening shoegaze base while adding a melodic pop touch into the mix, resulting in a kind of Slowdive meets Low feel. The EP opens on familiar enough territory, with the chiming guitar and hazy vocals of “Ginger,” but the turn happens with the strings and female lead-in on “Lemongrass.” The tune manages to turn both light and dark, with an underlying steady pummel of drums keeping it intact as the vocals swoon with airier flourishes. “Golden Ways” adds on the low wave of reverb washing against the guitar, effects deftly employed without inundating the song, and closer “Boystown” may be the best offering, though it also feels only half developed – sparse and only 1:48 long. The song could stand as a reflection for the EP as whole. Yens shows She Sir keeping what made them great 4 years ago, but also proving that the time between has yielded fruitful expansion. Yet the EP also feels largely like a teaser, like the songs have a bit to grow as they are more fully explored, and hopefully a sign of the band’s output to come.
Websites:
www.shesir.com
Myspace
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The English Teeth – English Teeth (SR)
The English Teeth certainly don’t try to hide their Anglophilia, as if it wasn’t obvious enough from their name and album cover. Yet as much as the trio plays the role of British Invasion refugees, their debut EP still kicks out solid and indelible rockers. The jagged riffs that scar across “Catastrophe” to open the album rough up the Kinks, but the Teeth find their bite with “Invasion,” a furious, yelping burst of pure, ragged garage freakout. “Cursed” kicks a Stonesy blues swagger with a southern rock flashpoint, while “Cracks” cruises slightly poppier waters with the vocals buried back further into the mix. Everything comes together for the closer “Bloody Knuckles,” however, the raked electric blues riff that leads in giving way to an unruly howl, declaring, “That’s right put the drugs in the brown bag, are you the devil or my doctor dressed in drag - man.” There’s a rockabilly heart to the tune, but several generations removed and filtered through that English translation. While there’s nothing particularly novel or new to the English Teeth, they deliver what you’d expect, and do that damn well.
Website:
Myspace
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The Eastern Sea – EP II (SR)
The second eponymously titled EP from the Eastern Sea continues to prove Matthew Hines one of Austin’s most mesmerizing songwriters, composing impressively arranged odes. EP II still flashes a bit of Sufjan Stevens in Hines’ delicate croon, but the quintet also sounds as if it has come much more into its own. Opener “The Mountain” compromises with mortality under the quick snare snap, but as the song continues to unwind over its four minutes, the result is a lull that becomes intoxicatingly euphoric. The Eastern Sea rightfully lets their songs breath with time, with only one of the four tunes running under four minutes. The easy shifts through “The Sea” strike a calm call in its solitude, even as Hines’ flirt into the upper ranges of his vocals feel uneasily deployed. The six minute closer “Your House” may be the best of the sprawling epics, dripping with both anticipation and disappointment at the edge of leaving: “I’m a silhouette in smoke, I’m caught and torn between, all the promises are broke, and pour in the gasoline.” Yet it’s the relatively short (just under 3:00 minutes) “The Name” that surprises most on the EP – a full-force guitar ripped indie rocker that surges despite Hines subdued delivery. Even here, though, the band can’t help but contort into unexpected arrangements, the song dropping down to only drums and then turning into an acoustic shouter before exploding once again into fuzz. At times like this the Eastern Sea seems to carry their songs too far away from their essence and make them unnecessarily convoluted, but as tightly controlled as the band proves, it’s a fair tradeoff.
Websites:
www.theeasternsea.com/
Myspace
