Author: Sam

As Fast As: Destroy the Plastique Man

Sam

Seek and Destroy

As Fast As pull out their Plastique

It’s an unpredictable world we live in. The Red Sox keep winning the World Series, a Canadian dollar is now worth more than our pathetic greenback [this originally ran in 2008, height of the financial crisis], and that hack from American Idol, Daughtry, is among the best-selling rock acts in the world. Now I find there isn’t a single giant pop-rock singalong on the new As Fast As album.

What is the world coming to?

Well, it turns out Spencer Albeee and company have traded in their standard McCartney-Wings pop for a ’70s style more informed by the Bay City Rollers, the Bee Gees, and Yes, in the process knocking out something of a concept album. Destroy the Plastique Man is the band’s first since parting ways with Octone/A&M Records, with which the band released only 2006’s Open Letter to the Damned, an update of the band’s local debut by the same name in 2004. However, combined with Albee projects the Popsicko (self-titled, 2001) and Rocktopus (I Love You! Good Morning!, 2002; Something Fierce, 2003), which featured pieces of the current AFA lineup, there is a five-album track record of big, singalong choruses, cheery piano parts, and loud guitars that might lead one to expect more of the same.

As Fast As prove here, though, that history is a poor predictor of future performance. Penned by Albee, the tunes here still largely conform to pop songwriting convention, with verse-chorus-bridge construction, but the chords are less than bright, virtually every instrument sports a digital buzz, and the time signatures aren’t always 4/4. Albee has shown an inclination for the dark before — this is, after all, the guy who wrote: “Maybe you love me/ Maybe I’m a monkey/ Maybe you’re just bored with a belly full of drinks, so you want to take me home and fuck me” — but he never before seemed so interested in making you uncomfortable, poking you in the ribs with contrapuntal notes instead of rubbing your belly with major-chord melody.

As for that concept, the album basically details the psychedelic wanderings of Albee alter-ego Aaron (it’s his middle name, and the middle name of guitarist Zach Jones and bassist Pat “Hache Horchatta” Hodgkins, as well), who wakes up to crickets and loons in the 30-second opener and seems to be the Plastique Man of the title track, wondering: “Can I finally learn to love myself?” You want to talk ’70s? The opening of that title track apes Frampton’s whole talking-through-the-guitar thing, but actually makes it a melodic and workable chorus, “I don’t know what the meaning of tomorrow is/ But I know what it is to take the fall,” juxtaposed with Albee’s normal-voiced narrative verses: “He’ll destroy the plastique man/ Then he’ll learn to love again.”

I’ll leave the psychoanalysis for you armchair types out there, but I’ll tell you the digital laser beams that shoot through the song, paired with chords that punch like a Brahms string section and the ghost of a violin, build tension here in all the right ways (guest spots here include Stu Mahan, John Maclaine, Dominic Lavoie, DJ Moore, Aren Sprinkle, Jay Villani, Holly Nunan, Angela Doxsey, Dave Noyes, Emily Dix Thomas, and Garry Bowcott — I’m not going to parse them all).

This is definitely a headphones album. A rocket launch races around the channels in “Homewrecker,” where Aaron “can be good/ I can be pure/ I can convince you if you’re not sure.” Then an electric guitar builds late over sampled shouts and yelling, before Albee upgrades the chorus with a yelled high harmony and some trumpet or trombone. This is Pet Sounds pop, with doubled and tripled vocals, but devoid of the syrup that infuses Smile.

Digital loops, sometimes seeming aimless, often pop up in the left channel without warning. Basses are always fuzzed and thrumming. Keyboard solos sometimes are so affected it’s hard to perceive the tone. Pair those with handclaps for percussion, lush vocal harmonies, and beautifully crafted rhyming verses, and it can be sometimes difficult to find your bearings, but Albee’s doing that on purpose and it’s a good thing.

“Sleighjacking” is a deliciously odd Christmas tune, with a Latin beat tied to a Kingston Trio delivery. “Your Lips to G-d’s Ears” is like a heavy rock tune without the guitars and a lyrical device where Albee repeats the last couple words of each line: “I got hot dripped juices on my chin, on my chin/ I see slap-shot pretty shaking in, shaking in/ I shake my head, cuz bitch trashed mommy, shakin in, shakin in.” And then the chorus is so sweetly delivered, “I know just what you’re going through,” a move from indifference to empathy.

“Somebody’s Fool” is where things run disco, full on glitter ball, like what you’d hear on the new Taylor McFerrin (yep, Bobby’s son) album.

Finally, there is the “single,” which is greatly matured and nuanced compared to “The Single,” that triumphantly graced the Popsicko album. “Dancing a Murderous Tango,” gracing the airwaves on WCYY, opens with scritchy fiddles, then a chugging guitar line paired with the bass. The “c’mon” that finishes each line of the verse recalls (Albee’s other band, maybe you’ve heard of it) Rustic Overtones’ “C’Mon” off Viva Nueva, and the back-and-forth in the verse perfectly mimics the lock-step of the tango: “You think it’s sad/ I think it’s funny … you say death/ I say destruction … You say purpose/ I say function.”

Then there’s the big, expansive chorus, where Albee lets loose with all his chords will give him: “We’re dancing a murderous tango/ I’ll take your word/ Take me for everything.” He’s opened himself up laid himself bare. Take it and do with it what you will.

Baltic Sea: Period Piece

Sam

Minding every Period

The Baltic Sea craft a crisp dystopia

It’s been nearly three years since the Baltic Sea’s phenomenal debut, Through Scenic Heights and Days Regrets, but when you’re making music like this, I can see how it might take a while to build a second edifice [this ran originally in 2011]. An artful construction of post-rock meandering and serious guitar heroics, the brand-new Period Piece can be even more ponderous, but also has more extended periods of high-energy explosiveness, making for an album like a cross-country drive, miles of pastures and sunflower fields rolling by between cities that dominate the skyline.

With seven songs comprising the hour of music here, you know you’re in for some multi-faceted pieces, and Baltic Sea don’t ease you into things. The opening “The Free Design” is over 14 minutes, beginning with a repeating high-register guitar note like an ice pick and hinting at some true prog. But by the time Todd Hutchisen’s vocals enter, backed by Nate Johnson (who made the band a five-piece since the last release), the song is a force of nature, driven by Jason Stewart (Sidecar Radio, 6gig), who has replaced Jason Ingalls on the drums.

The whomping digital percussion is like a combination of Air and Minus the Bear, especially with Hutchisen’s high vocals, before an effect chops them up and spits them back out rippled and unintelligible. The early section is attacking, like the Conifer records but not quite as heavy, though Ray Suhy (Colepitz) does deliver something close to a metal solo on guitar, setting you up for a full pull-back to acoustic at 6:30.

There’s even a slide guitar, hinting at a country vibe, with a poppy bass from Jeremy Smith. But the guitars soon snarl back in, a crunching fuzz in the right channel, an ascending guitar riff in the left.

Finally, they cycle back to the opening vocal take, getting fairly sunshiney with the harmony, Stewart doing a martial thing on the snare, before slowing down to a crawl like a wind-up box running out its last rotations.

Whew. One song in and you feel like you’ve made a major investment in the album.

And, I know: If you like singalongs, this doesn’t sound like the band for you; if you’re into this kind of proggy rock, you’re no stranger to multi-suite songwriting. So what’s the big deal?

Well, first, this isn’t some kind of Rush/Yes homage. Baltic Sea are much more charming and aloof than that, and while they’re nerdy enough to have a song called “MirrorrorriM” and design an album that’s virtually symmetrical in its musical presentation, they also can put together songs like “Foss,” with sections that could rest comfortably on “Bridge over Troubled Water,” string arrangements by Dave Noyes meshing perfectly into guitar riffs like lightning bolts, energy crackling right up to a dénouement of fade-out.

There may also be birds chirping at one point. It’s hard to say.

Sure, there’s weird robot-gal talking about booster rockets and shit in the open of “Swiss Ticking Time,” but the way the elastic “just pretend to seem alarmed” bit launches into ’70s rock at the five-minute mark is genuinely thrilling, Hutchisen calling for you to sing along to a “la, la, la” bit that manages to be both mocking and completely heart-felt at the same time.

The title track gets pretty damn head-nodding, too, with a minute of music you could listen to for an hour straight and be totally happy with, inserted between sections where the drums seem to hit every five seconds and guitar harmonics chime in like gemstones falling onto a pipe organ. That sound’s only bested by the spacey intro to “MirrorrorriM,” which has strong positive association, like a super hero’s theme song, or maybe Supertramp.

Only in the closing “The All Consumers,” a 13-minute amusement-park ride, do the Baltic Sea completely let it all hang out. There are sections here of true chaos, a car-wreck in slow motion with theremin, industrial sounds like banging pipes. But there’s also what might be Hutchisen’s best vocal take, a low-register and breathy delivery with gravitas, sitting on top of intermittent 10-note guitar runs.

The best bit on the album might be where they take a two-minute chunk of guitar noodling and basically just change up the tone and effect, making them instantly aggressive and menacing where they’d seconds before been jammy and esoteric. Like the rest of the album, it makes you start to question what you’re hearing and why you’re feeling the way you do about it, and what you “like” in a song.

No, there’s nothing here that’s easily consumable, nor particularly summery, but, like the Whitcomb record before it this year, if you love to think about your music as much as you feel it and hear it, Period Piece is a must-listen.