Skip to main content

Au Revoir Simone :: The Bird of Music

I haven't been this happy to be sad since I first listened to Carissa's Weird


Okay, I admit it: I liked The Murmurs' first album. Just let me get that right out in the open. There's just something about girls singing high harmony that just melts my black heart. So charge your glasses, my friends, because tonight we toast to the sweet and easy.


Indie rock in 2007 seemed shadowed, to me, by a forest cluttered with timbres of math rock nouveau (Battles) and Brian Wilson wannabes (Dirty Projectors, Panda Bear, Animal Collective). Filling albums with complex overtures, changing time signatures, and discordant melodies, many songs could be described as little more than controlled chaos; more complicated than complex. So it is refreshing to hear bands, like Au Revoir Simone, who write music rooted in simplicity.


I use the word "simplicity", here, as a compliment, not to suggest the music is boring or limited. True, Au Revoir Simone harmonize on the major scale. However, they do so with a fresh sincerity. At no time during the album did I feel I was being "sold" a song; there is no apparent cynicism, no ambition to be a chart-topper. Rather, the album sounds like a final letter to a lover ("we fold like icicles on paper shelves"). A letter you inadvertently intercepted, perused, and later felt guilty for reading because of its openness and honesty. With lines that are somewhat introverted, yet unaware of themselves, the songs come off as wholly unpretentious. A welcome relief.


Unfortunately, like other music in the Alco-Pop genre (a term I just coined, by the way), it doesn't take much to have too much. I've listened to The Bird of Music twice now, and my head is swimming a little. Not in a bad way, but I know if I have one more go, it'll put me over the edge, andI'll end up making out with the lady from human resources. So let this be a warning: listen to Au Revoir Simone responsibly.


So if you like The Bachelorette, Postal Service, Stereolab, or Grandaddy, I think you will like this little trio. Oh, and if you're in Montreal, check them out. They're playing tonight at La Tulipe. I tried to get my little sister to go, but she said she'd only go if I did, and the price of direct flights between Wellington and Montreal were a bit restrictive--one could even go so far as to say nonexistent.


Band :: Au Revoir Simone

Album :: The Bird of Music

Song :: Sad Song


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Celebrate Halloween with Peter Squires's New Video, "Witch"

I don't usually do festive or holiday posts. In fact, the closest I get is writing some kind of seasonal bent against a track, and only then when I've had too much coffee and can't find any relation to a song other than what the weather is doing. I just think holiday-themed posts / articles are lazy. But Halloween is different. Why? Because Halloween, to paraphrase Wesley Willis, whips a horse's ass. So when Ryan from The Musebox put me on to Peter Squires a few days ago, I knew it was going into the annals of Duck & Cover (that's right, I said "annals" on the Internets). From the Press Release: Peter’s direct and honest vocal delivery is reminiscent of contemporaries such as Kimya Dawson and Luke Temple. The album is all heart, laid bare for our aural pleasure. Woe Is Me was recorded in Peter Squires’ Brooklyn bedroom and is available on his website for fans to download at no charge. The first video from the album is “Witch” and it was just rele...

The Pogues + The Dubliners = St. Patrick's Rovers

In celebration of St. Patrick's day, and because I spent a good deal of time living on Ireland's west coast (if you can call Limerick a coast), here's an old video of The Pogues and The Dubliners singing "Irish Rover." I love the fact that Shane MacGowan is puffing away at a rollie on stage--and I'm pretty sure it's not water in that styrofoam cup. This video reminds me of a musician I palled around with during my stint in stab city. A mesmerizing performer, Damo would often celebrate the fact he scored a gig before the gig itself. When it was time for him to go on, he would be completely trollied; too drunk for his own performance (which, if you knew Damo, you would concede is no small feat). Damn, I miss those guys.

Lucero Video for "Darken My Door"

Darken My Door from Lucero on Vimeo . It's good to see that a serious band doesn't have to take itself seriously. Even better when a band's fans don't take them too seriously. "Darken My Door" off of Lucero's latest album, 1372 Overton Park , is a song about losing stuff--girlfriend, money, dignity. In fact, a lot of Lucero's songs are like that, but I'm not getting into that now. I'm talking about the video, which has so much to love. Obviously, I love the fact director Alex Mecum has used a puppet as the protagonist. But it's what the puppet does that makes this video so much fun. Puppet eating chili dogs, puppet drinking whiskey, puppet giving blow jobs . . . Hell, there's even puppet vomit! It's ridiculous, yes, but also tragic. By the end of the video, if you don't feel a little sorry for the scruffy faced whore puppet, then you have no soul. Here's a little more about the videos for Lucero's new album: To promot...