CD Details
Synopsis
Album Description"The city is broken again. If you don't believe me, take a look at your friends." And thus begins the final track on Pinebender's second full-length, The High Price of Living Too Long With a Single Dream (THPOLTLWASD). In many ways it's doubtful that the Chicago natives' city is anywhere near broken, at least not artistically. If you take a quick look at the city?s prolific musical output in the past year, Chicago seems to be intent on recasting itself as a forward-thinking renaissance, but like most movements/moments, nobody is nearly self-conscious or sober enough to take note. It's a rare Chicago night that you don't run into Pinebender's Chris Hansen; always soft-spoken and accommodating, it's hard to believe his band brings forth one of the most sonically grand live shows in town -- "Playing down-tempo and very loud lets us lull the audiences into submission," says Hansen. "Loud" is an understatement: it's as if the band fell off a cliff and hit "Record" on the very moment of impact. The instrumentation of the band is vital to that sound. Hansen continues, "Just before we started playing together, Matt had traded in some gear for a baritone guitar. The instrument worked perfectly in the band. Not only does it sound great, but the baritone can serve as both the low-end rhythm and lead guitar." Pinebender's Lovitt debut finds the band landing beautiful combinations. The record's "balls"-heavy guitar cannonades are always balanced with astute dynamics. A sense of quietude offsets the bombast, leaving the song brewing with some threat of explosion, a direct (though most likely unaware) response to the oft-fey, post-post rock lineage that led the city through most of the last decade. THPOLTLWASD is a 48-minute celebration of impossible designs, love lost, and fond farewells to old vices and good friends. "I wrote most of these songs at times when the rug had been pulled out from under me, or when I was looking to have the rug pulled out from under me again. Many things had changed up on me. Good friends that I figured would always be around began moving away. I came up with some unsound remedies for that realization. The city I love had gotten expansive and empty for a little while." THPOLTLWASD is a distinctive, crystallized expression of uncertainty, and its expansive barrage of sound crashes and thunders with a mischievous confidence. Pinebender has performed with such renowned acts as Yo La Tengo, And You Will Know Us By Trail Of Dead, Jets To Brazil, J. Mascis, Cinerama, Silkworm, Grandaddy, Denali, Engine Down, Shiner, 90 Day Men, Joan of Arc, Scrawl, Gaunt, Eleventh Dream Day, Poster Children, and Pedro The Lion. They plan on touring the U.S. throughout Summer and Fall 2003.
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CD Reviews
The High Price of Living Too Long with a Single Dream Mike Newmark | Tarzana, CA United States | 12/15/2004 (4 out of 5 stars) "Right now, in little Poughkeepsie NY, I'm rounding out the first semester of my freshman year, and on the whole things seem to be going pretty well. Classes are slowing down to a slow trawl as finals approach, I've been working and playing like a maniac jumped up on too much caffeine, and I haven't been written up in the security guards' slam book once. Even the notorious roommate situation is running much more smoothly than I expected. We don't talk with each other too much, preferring to exist in space without acknowledging each other's presence a good 90% of the time, but we're not at each other's throats or throwing things across the room at each other either, which says a grand something about our relationship. There is, however, one sticking point that continues to irritate both of us equally: we have drastically different tastes in music. His playlist is chock full of pop-punk and emo bands such as Thursday and A New Found Glory. Aside from Sparta and old-school emo like Sunny Day Real Estate (which doesn't really count since the original definition of emo has been flayed beyond recognition since 1994's "Diary"), I won't go near the stuff, preferring the angularity and complexity of post-rock and other left-of-center movements in `80s and `90s indie rock. With Pinebender's debut full length, The High Price of Living Too Long with a Single Dream, I think I've come up with an album that will satisfy both of our sonic palettes. The music works in stadium-sized gestures, with pounding drums, swells of guitar and melodic, emotional singing while keeping everything gritty enough to recall the likes of 1994-era Ride and Swervedriver.
The album begins innocently enough, as a typical alt-rock riff sets the stage and adds a layer of reverb-y guitar alongside it, before launching into a grandiose pummel of heavily distorted guitar and slow, crashing drums. "Varsity," a clear standout, picks up where the first track left off, with heavy, enveloping power chords that again beat the listener into blissful submission. Add to that an unassuming time signature and emotional (but not necessarily "emo") vocals, and you're left with a frighteningly brilliant sonic document sure to please just about any rock listener. "Well Calibrated Moral Compass" is so beautiful, so dreamy, and so well executed that it sounds like a lost classic from the dusty vaults of early-90s shoegaze (check the whooshes of feedback and heavily hazy guitar harmonies for proof).
I mentioned the word "heavy" or one of its variations three times in the last paragraph, and that alone should tell you that this album is heavy, heavy, heavy. Guitars and drums work in sync like sledgehammers to the back of the head, and the consistently slow tempos keep the textures thick. The atmosphere is moody and heartfelt throughout, like an emo-tinged Codeine on steroids. In addition to the aural assault and the loud volumes, though, there exists another layer deep within the music of almost celestial beauty, a dreamy fuzz that's implied rather than played outright.
Whether Pinebender considered implementing that element into their music, or whether it just came as a result of adept instrumentation and a good ear for dynamism, is open to question. But what is for certain is Pinebender's ability to create a universally acceptable piece of modern guitar rock. It's not a classic, but it easily satiates the stomachs of those looking for lots of melody and solid songcraft, as well as the minds of those looking for something arty that always pleases but never spoonfeeds. Who knows... As the second semester rolls around, my roommate and I might beat each other with dirty socks or wrestle each other to the ground over whose turn it is to sweep the floor, but I'm assured that I can play Pinebender at a high volume inside the dorm room and both of our heads will be nodding contentedly.
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Track Listings (8) - Disc #1