a r t i s t : Lucky Dragons
t i t l e : Widows
d a t e : 2006
l a b e l : Marriage Records
c a t :
s o u r c e : Promo
g e n r e : Avantgarde
r l s. d a t e : 2007-03-09
t r a c k s : 16
b i t r a t e : 172 kbps avg
s i z e : 49.06MB
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At its worst, pastiche pop can be uber painful: a bedroom studio sand trap
of too-arbitrary decisions and awkward musicianship that keeps listeners at
arm's length and confuses people into attending shows they end up despising.
At its best, though, it's honeyed goodness, an avant-garde puff of a genre
with real-world cred (the Books at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts!) and a
welcome lack of over-theorized aims or thematic rigor save for melody and
cut-and-paste experimentation. Of course, there's a thin line between muck
and honey, and whether due to unresolved thematic concerns or underwhelming
execution (or both), even the accomplished and talented can trip on their
own ambitions.
With Widows, however, Lucky Dragons (a.k.a. Luke Fischbeck) has decidedly
sidestepped muck and achieved honey. The LP is his fourth record, and it
shows a balanced maturity of deft execution and sophisticated thematic
cohesion. Widows manages to pose itself as the answer to its own big
question, namely: Where'd wonder go? It's a lofty query, and ultimately the
record is built on sonic slivers too thin to achieve the majestic,
redemptive status with regard to re-affirming innocence that it seems to
perhaps want to tackle. Nevertheless, Widows engages the ineffable on an
intimate, manageable plane to pleasing effect; it's a brightly lit,
organic-digital melange of unidentifiable instrumentation and nearly
wordless hum-singing, and one whose guiding hand makes fresh decisions
infused with a bravely un-ironic sense of humor.
The first indication of the record's sparkle-and-fade aesthetic is opener
"New Alium," an exploratory meditation that flirts so hard with melody that
rhythm is almost left home to watch television. A crackling acoustic
something (dulcimer?) fades in, glitching its way along past the oasis of
determinacy. Cue fittingly supporting melodic drumming and some vague
voices, all complemented by scribbles of beyond-Chipmunk sped-up singing. "V
Pattern" is almost two minutes of wind instruments (i.e. reed honks),
shakers, trumpets and human yelps revolving around a simple, repeating
melody, and the song fades out precisely before it loses steam. A jangle-y
acoustic guitar and tambourine duet on the simple "Hello New Friend," only
to be joined by nearly whispered human harmonies that solidify it into a
near-song.
Only rarely do these excursions veer into the aimlessly tedious. "Sleep and
Sneezes" is fourteen seconds of exactly what it purports to be, simply
accelerated until nearly unrecognizable; it's unfunny. Even after repeated
listens, "Snow Circle" remains too long and disparate. It's unclear why
Fischbeck didn't stop to cleave its enjoyable parts into a few stronger
pieces. And at times, the over-reliance on ProTools gimmickry grates.
But despite a few missteps, Widows is a strangely mimetic triumph, helping
us remember wonder simply by making us actually wonder: at what we're
listening to, at how it's being accomplished, at why we like it. The songs
smack of Silver Apples "Noodles" and remain short, but brevity is essential
when you're trying to tell the kinds of sentimental jokes this record tells.
Patterns are repeated from song-to-song or only slightly varied, structure
flits in and out, lyrics are nonexistent, the singing is far from concrete,
and yet Lucky Dragons collates these scraps into necessary, complete
thoughts. If similes are to be believed, the whole thing sounds like an
attic being turned upside-down-an airy spring cleaning of the mind. And
therein lies the rub: Every time you try to clean things up, you just end up
remembering why you didn't throw them out in the first place.
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01-New Alium [ 2:40 ]
02-Aluvum Te Na Hagaru [ 2:06 ]
03-Sheep And Sneezes [ 0:14 ]
04-The Sound Of Waves [ 6:55 ]
05-Dissolve Yourself [ 2:34 ]
06-V Pattern [ 1:50 ]
07-Death Friends [ 0:57 ]
08-Summer Swans [ 1:59 ]
09-Dark Falcon [ 2:55 ]
10-Peasantries [ 1:42 ]
11-Pleasantries [ 0:36 ]
12-Care For [ 1:29 ]
13-Hello New Friend [ 2:00 ]
14-Complement Song [ 2:31 ]
15-Snowing Circle [ 6:03 ]
16-Returner [ 0:44 ]
[ ]
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37:15 min