Friday, February 03, 2006

One Hundred Fifty or Less

75 or Less, the preferred music review site of the attention-deficient, has spawned a record label, 75 or Less Records. They are currently offering two EPs of guitar rock, both urgent in the Dischord sense.

My hunch is that the good people at 75 or less would appreciate a concise, unpretentious capsules, so here goes: my 75 words or less on songs from each of their EPs.

The first two tracks from A Passing Feeling's self-titled EP are made for standing up on a sticky floor, drinking beer, and screaming along. It's music for rowdy people in the era of tweeness. In the manic Book of Matches (mp3), they show a knack for melody, energy, and vocal delivery. The rousing Probably (mp3), begins "You're probably wasted/I'm probably wasting my every word/We're not going anywhere..." My guess is that they are going somewhere.

Pixelated Ones & Zeroes (mp3), from Staggering Statistics' EP with the same title, is scruffy and unshaven. It brings to mind Here's When The Strings Come In-Era Superchunk, especially lead singer Austin Brown's unrefined voice. I'm not complaining. Like Superchunk or Pavement, repeated listens offer increasing rewards, in this case bringing you into the rhythm section, and its complex relationship with the guitar. It's not for everybody, and that, I think, is the whole point.

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