Tapes 'n Tapes - The Loon
Being a hopelessly unhip old fart, I don't keep up with the hottest new bands anymore (not that I ever did, I liked what I liked, cool or not). I had seen a blurb somewhere, in fact more than one somewhere, about this album and band. Now that I have an iPod, I took all those CDs piled up in the rack that have one or two good songs on them, ripped the good songs, and took them to Manifest to trade in. I picked up the remasters of Led Zep II and III, the G3 (Joe Satriani, Eric Johnson, and Steve Vai) DVD, and this.
Popped it in the CD player in the car, have not taken it out since, have listened to the whole thing 4 or 5 times now. The last album I listened to that much from the get-go was Candy-O by the Cars back in '79. You know how you put in a CD, and listen for the "good" songs, of which there are usually 1 -5, and the rest is filler? Not the case here. The only album I've listened to in the last few years that was this good start to finish is How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb by U2.
A little background, the group is from Minneapolis, according to their website they played Chapel Hill last Halloween. They have opened for Franz Ferdinand and Soul Asylum, and are lined up for this year's Coachella festival in California. They have a self-titled EP and then this, which I think is a masterpiece. I'm not going to do a song-by-song review, because they are all awesome. The first time I listened to it, I thought, hmm, this is weird. You know me, I'm all over weird, heck, I think Trout Mask Replica is one of the greatest albums of all time. Anyway, there was something beyond the weirdness that compelled me to listen again. Now, in hindsight, I realize the weirdness was due to the instrumentation and arrangements, which are very unconventional and unique. The instruments are very sparse, with an occasional weird noise pulled in for rhythm. Having seen some live videos (links below), the sparse instrumentation allows for very accurate re-creation on stage.
The something beyond the weirdness is genius. These are great songs, and the unique arrangements take this far beyond same old, same old status. The best way I can describe this is Dinosaur Jr. meets The Replacements (Minneapolis influence) meets early Talking Heads, with a little Radiohead thrown in for good measure.
I cannot recommend this album enough, you'll find yourself listening to it over and over.
Rating: *****, with a Peabody Certified Head Music stamp to boot.
Links: Check this one out, killer live video, they even have iPod versions, which I will definitely be downloading. - http://www.scheduletwo.com/video/index.php?vid=7
Tapes 'n Tapes official page
Wikipedia entry for Tapes 'n Tapes
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