Song, by Toad

Ooh, interesting interesting.  And really rather weird.  Erik Gundel introduced himself to me as ‘that guy from Motel Motel’ and whilst I liked a lot of their songs, I find this vastly more intriguing.

With this sort of strange stuff the sequencing is always crucial, and in this case it is executed really well.  We’re gently lulled in with a spot of unthreatening instrumentalism in the form of Turkulent Indigo.  Then Birdy sort of hints at where the rest of the EP is going, but is still rather a tame version of the music language in which this release communicates.

The centrepiece of the EP is Lake on My Roof, and this is really rather weird, but nevertheless in a friendly and melodic and welcoming sort of way, before Head of Ribbon just smacks you in the chops with the strangeness.  It sounds like some sort of sonically-based puzzle from late 70s sci-fi film where the hero is trying to escape from a dizzying chamber of lights.  Gundel doesn’t even bother with lyrics, just a misbehaving, synthesised cousin of a church organ breathing in and out at irregular intervals.  An oddly, don’t ask me why, it isn’t shit.  Closing things out is the peace offering of Antacids Love Song, slightly quirky of lyric, but otherwise quite a straight-up song.

And that’s the odd contradiction of this EP.  Depending on what he’s sick of reading about in reviews, Gundel could easily be exhasperatedly saying ‘Well if you listen to it, not a lot of it is actually all that weird’.  And he’d be right.  Then again, not an awful lot of this is played straight, either.  Of the five songs only two, perhaps, could be described as plain vanilla pop songs, and even then you’d be stretching a point to do so.

Either way, this is a challenging and a rewarding listen, perfectly put together and unsettlingly compelling, if you know what I mean.  I wouldn’t say that I love all of it, but it’s definitely one of the most engaging things I’ve heard in ages.

Erik Gundel – Lake on My Roof

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Erik Gundel on MySpace – you’re going to have to message him on MySpace to buy the EP, but I promise you, it’s worth it.

I rather like this.  I’d heard Harlem floating about the internets for a while so when I first played the album my initial thoughts were: “Big pop song first?  Oh dear, bad sign.”  All too often that is a sign of a band with either little material or little confidence, and so it has become something of a warning sign for me, I have to confess.  It was a bit of a false alarm in this case however, as there’s a lot more good stuff here.

It reminds me a tad of the Felice Brothers during its gentler moments and slightly of Howl, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club’s Americana album, when it gets a bit more furious.  The vocal is a nasal yowl which steps up the gears really effectively, turninging into an impassioned, slightly Gollum-esque shriek at the pinnacle of its distress.

On one hand this is a rock ‘n’ roll inflected Americana album, as you might guess from the above comparisons, but there’s a little more to it than that.  There’s also quite a lot of chiming guitary distressed indie in the mix as well.  You could just about drag out elements from bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah or the Walkmen, if you really wanted to, but in general that shuffle between friendly Americana and thumping, distorted indie rock climaxes is the defining characteristic of this record.

It’s one which I find just slightly uneasy at times, I have to confess.  I do get to the point with this record where the thumping crescendoes can be a bit much for my ears – just a little overwhelming in some senses, whilst perhaps lacking the texture which might make them more interesting.  That might not be quite the right way to describe it, but there’s definitely something in their bigger, louder, more thunderous moments which I don’t quite like and am finding it tricky to put my finger on.

For the most part, though, I think this is a very good album: it’s got real energy and bite, and the songs stick in your head with tenacity.  And what more could you ask for?

Motel Motel – Harlem

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Motel Motel – Mexico

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