#4 plus

I’m rather picky when it comes to anything to do with ska or anything under the ska umbrella, but Long Island three piece (sometimes six piece), Eli Whitney & The Sound Machine make my elitist cut. I can’t pin point what it is about this band that I just plain dig, but unlike many ska related bands, they don’t annoy me, at all.

Their debut full length, Mickey, kicks off with the infectious "My Response To A Stephen Jerzak Concert." Seeing the title of this track on paper led me to believe this would be a killer, and I was correct. The track is catchy for obvious reasons such as melodies and gang vocals, but it's what is sung that sticks in my mind the most. Dual vocalists Craig Shay and Mike Vizzi illustratively recount experiences to ensure you feel you’re right there with them. These descriptive words about a ‘smokey room’ contrast well with stern anthem chant, ‘Fuck stereotypes and fuck ignorance/ Fuck this smallmindedness/ You might hate growing up/ But I hate people acting like kids/ If you fill your head with garbage it’ll come out your mouth/ Yeah, this is fun but is it all you’re about?’

"Ridgewood" and "Us" present a less energetic Eli Whitney & The Sound Machine, complete with steady and simplistic horns, which were perhaps the draw card for me.

Apparently someone was really looking out for fans of WHY? last Friday since Sod in the Seed was slated for an August 14th release date.  Yet, here we are, able to download the album for free four days early.

I previously reviewed the EP's single and had expressed the hope that the rest of the songs would sound similar to "Sod in the Seed".  And they do.  Well, sort of.

The bass driven sound that was missing from Eskimo Snow returns on Sod in the Seed (Alopecia fans rejoice!); there are plenty of gorgeous oohs and ahs, plenty of quickly spoken lyrics, and a lot of melodies that you can dance to.  It's pretty much everything I had hoped for.

However, it's not that cohesive so sometimes it seems like the verse and chorus of a song don't flow together. The lyrics are a bit different than we're used to from Yoni Wolf.  Some may think he's lost his edge. But, those are the people who want Wolf to be stuck in a moment, writing about the same thing over and over, never moving forward, and only writing about the things he shouldn't have said or done, the things he may regret, and the things that make him unhappy. I've seen this EP get a bunch of criticism but I am not really going down that road, though there are some things that I think could have been done to improve this EP.

Starting with the cover art and continuing with the catchy hooks and gang-vocals spread liberally throughout, this album shouts out to listeners that it is summertime and that we should all be out on a road trip to the nearest ocean or lake. There is a Buster Keaton-esque energy to it, a sort of frenetic “getup letsgo thereisSOMUCHtodowithyourLIFE.” The first track specifically provides an example with its upbeat greeting.

When you do manage to extricate yourself from the grooves you’ve worn into your computer chair and get to a body of water, this is indeed the album you’ll want to use as a soundtrack to your roadtrip. It is made of an eclectic collection of songs that nonetheless bear the aesthetic stamp of The Mowgli’s. I thoroughly appreciate their blend of acoustic instruments with electric guitars; despite all the electricity running through the project they manage to maintain an organic sound. Those gang-shouts and group harmonies always come in at perfect moments.

I was on a hike today and I thought of this band I as we crested a peak on the trail and found ourselves overlooking the town of Lake Elizabeth and its twin lakes. I was thinking how much The Mowgli’s are unlike the other bands that I’ve been listening to lately: Modest Mouse, Man Man, Elliott Smith... All of these emotionally-distraught, introspective bastards. The Mowgli’s can’t be introspective because there are eight people singing at any one time. Listening to them is like hitch-hiking and getting invited into a van of smiling hippies without any weird hang-ups.

The artwork’s pretty gloomy. The title has a sense of doom. The lyrical content is heavy. Run, Forever’s The Devil, And Death And Me, does indeed deal with heavy subjects of gloom and doom thanks to a little reality called death. No fear though, Run, Forever’s seamless folk inspired punk-rock is more than enough to leave you pleasantly content after one listen.

The Pennsylvania trio make structured, self-assured tracks seem easy, particularly in opener "A Sequence Of Sad Events". The track opens with vocalist and guitarist Anthony Heubel recalling “I didn’t want to die young / I didn’t want to die at 21”, in a confident yet almost vulnerable state as he discusses the now ended life of close friend, Corey James Wolfram.

Good news for patient WHY? fans: after a long silence since 2009’s Eskimo Snow, we’re being rewarded with not one, but two new releases this year. And our first introduction isn't some weak 2 minute preview; we get almost 5 minutes of new WHY?! “Sod in the Seed” is the title track of the upcoming EP, out next month (8/13 – Europe, 8/14 – US) and I’m hoping it represents the tone for WHY?

Starting out with oohs and ahs, (probably provided by the lovely Liz Wolf who did the gorgeous oohs and ahhs on Alopecia) xylophone, and melodic singing, “Sod in the Seed” seems like an extension of Eskimo Snow until it kicks into a dance-y bass line which provides singer Yoni Wolf a platform for his characteristic (or shall we say, classic,) slow-rap/fast-talking lyrical style. 

Full of imagery continuing the train of thought from Eskimo Snow’s “This Blackest Purse,” (“the poser in the bowler gets shot first / thinks he’s the shit ‘cause he can spit and curse / acting brash and flashin’ a pistol that squirts”) Wolf discusses his feelings on indie fame, who he is in the public eye and who he is in his own eyes. I could be way off, but a lot of Wolf’s lyrics seem to scream out “I’m not as cool as you think I am and I actually feel unworthy of your time, why are you even listening to my music? Okay I guess I’m alright” and it’s his aloofness and blatantly honest slight self-deprecation that make you want more.

Reviewing this seems a little odd because of the lyrical content… It makes me wonder, does this make me one of the “wordy blogger thugs” who Yoni thinks “morbidly orbit your toilet like hornets”? I’d like to think not. I’d like to think I am in some neutral territory between the critics and the “groupies with big breasts” that end up part of your life when you’re “a minor star”.

I’m assuming the current line-up of musicians in the song also include Josiah Wolf and Doug McDiarmid, but as the entire band are multi-instrumentalists I can’t tell you exactly who is doing what, but the music is fun, dance-y, bass driven, and somehow manages to combine the mellow and oddly upbeat mood of Eskimo Snow with the funk of Alopecia.

Whether I’ve delved into the inner workings of Wolf’s brain (yadda yadda) or I am completely off base, the lyrics are still awesome and the song is a great follow-up to earlier releases. It’s reassured me that WHY? will keep doing what I love them for while still growing and expanding their boundaries and influences.

Are you a new WHY? fan?

If you like the lyrical style of this song, you’ll like pretty much all of Alopecia, but especially “The Fall of Mr. Fifths,” “Twenty Eight,” “A Sky for Shoeing Horses Under,” and Elephant Eyelash’s “Crushed Bones”.

If you like the lyrical content of this song, although none of these songs have lyrics quite as witty as "you can gather up the contents of the catcher’s cup and suck," you’ll like Eskimo Snow’s “This Blackest Purse” and “Even the Good Wood Gone,” and Alopecia’s “Good Friday.”