Pershing: A Review
Written by ashkap on Monday, 3 of March , 2008 at 9:26 pm
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin.
A name.
A band.
A legend.
SSLYBY (sly boy, silly bee, Sicily bye) have just released their sophmore effort,
The art is interesting to say the least. I’ve had multiple people tell me it looks like anything from feces to leaves. moving on…
SSLYBY has been one of my favorite bands for a long time, as evidenced by my last.fm page on which one can see that SSLYBY is my 5th played artist, a mere 20 or so tracks away from the 4th, Radiohead. So how is it that I listen to a small indie pop band from Springfield, Missouri as much as the arguably greatest band of our time? The answer is not a conscious thing for me. SSLYBY make me feel good. They are a good band. They are not world famous nor revolutionary in their style nor instrumental masters. But the boys from Missouri trying their best to sound like what life is really like make them more genuine and real. In the coming decades one can only hope that with a generation of children reared on auto-tuned manufactured hits by artificial fronts for teams of hit-factories like Hannah Montana and The Jonas Brothers, real bands like SSLYBY can continue to exist and create music, that while not completely shocking, can make people feel tangible emotion. A song by [Sony music-thinktanks] may make it to the top on the ringtone downloads charts, but Broom and Pershing sound like a summer day. Not a notification that someone is trying to contact you, but the sound the ocean makes when it hits the shore. The sound that is made when all of your friends pile in the car to go to Coachella.
And now, the review.
Pershing is certainly a step in a different direction for SSLBY. Broom had its share of poppy runners, but the real (i.e. people who didn’t just get “Oregon Girl” from the OC soundtrack) fans gathered around songs like “House Fire” and “Anna Lee.” Pershing seems to be dominated by songs like “Oregon Girl” again, and in that sense, it works quite well. Lead single and opening track “Glue Girls,” along with “Boring Fountain,” “Modern Mystery,” second single and strongest track “Think I Wanna Die,” and “Oceanographer” all seem to go after the “I’ve been around the world but I never seen another Oregon girl” tack, although “Oceanographer,” the longest song on the album at 4:45, is bogged down by itself. “Glue Girls” and “Think I Wanna Die” particularly pull it off. “Boring Fountain” “Dead Right” and “The Beach Song.” are all great tracks. “Some Constellation” is a nice quieter song, and “You Could Write A Book” is also a staple SSLYBY song, harmonies and tight hooks all the way through. The album really shines on “Think I Wanna Die” and especially quasi-closing track “HEERS.” HEERS is the one that particularly matches the style and emotion of “House Fire”.
So is Pershing good? Yes. Is it great? Yes. Is it amazing? Most of the time, yes.
Category: Uncategorized, ashkap
- Add this post to
- Del.icio.us -
- Meneame -
- Digg
Comment by Evan
Made Tuesday, 11 of March , 2008 at 5:03 pm
I agree 100% with your review. Simple, whole hearted happy songs that put a smile on anyone’s face who gives it a listen.
I must say that I miss songs like What’ll We Do? and I am Warm and Powerful especially.
Great Release, I wish they’d come to Northampton, MA
