Review: It Hugs Back | Recommended Record

With little fanfare -- at least here in America -- Kent, England-based It Hugs Back has been steadily building a formidable catalog of records and singles over the last several years. Its latest long-player, Recommended Record, is a lush, engaging and often aurally stunning marvel that gives the foursome a strong claim on a place in the vanguard of contemporary psych-pop. The set is roughly split into motorik groovers ("Sometimes") and gentle strummers that cushion persistently breathy vocals ("Teenage Drone"), although there are exciting moments that don't fit neatly into either pile, such as the blaring freakout "Big Sighs." That the music on Recommended Record runs the stylistic gamut with such ease is a tribute to the highly-developed and tasteful songwriting of the group, songwriting that evidences a keen ability to synthesize elements from a well-chosen stylistic palette.

The set commences with the charged, propulsive and kaleidoscopic rush of "Sa Sa Sa Sails," a sugary rocker that drips with the same sort of shuddering, guitar-heavy psychedelia as the best moments of the early Mercury Rev catalog. Even with the level of bombast high on the track, It Hugs Back guitarist and singer Matt Simms, who also plays guitar for post-punk legends WIRE these days, continues to sing with his characteristically dreamy, even delivery. From there the collection makes the first of many tidy transitions, here to the hip-shaking, organ-addled preview track "Go Magic!," which cleverly contrasts megaphoned lead vocals with pretty, terraced vocal harmonies and closes with wondrous, clanging guitars. The logically titled "Piano Drone" channels German legends Neu!, and the spooky "Sometimes" channels The Flaming Lips channeling Neu!, but Recommended Record also touts plenty of the catchy guitar pop -- in the vein of the Pitchfork-acknowledged 2009 single "Workday" -- that It Hugs Back is best known for. These include album highlight "Teenage Hands," as well as "Skateboard Rhythm," and the poignant, burbling "Waiting Room." That latter tune touts a subdued melody with swirled rhythm guitar that could have been inspired, perhaps improbably, by the introduction to Grateful Dead's "Crazy Fingers." While all of these reference points suggests a record that sounds scattershot and disjointed, in fact just the opposite is true, and -- as ever -- It Hugs Back succeeds by setting its own parameters in creating a warm, fuzzy and insular aesthetic.

Recommended Record will be issued on Safe And Sound Records worldwide on Monday and you can purchase it on CD or vinyl directly from It Hugs Back right here. All purchases are rewarded with an immediate digital download of the collection, and the first 100 pre-orders come packaged with a bonus EP. We've embedded a stream of the entire album below. It Hugs Back's prior record, the sophomore set Laughing Party, was released a year ago. We featured It Hugs Back in number 12 of our recently resuscitated Show Us Yours feature back in 2009.



It Hugs Back: Internerds | Facebook | Soundcloud

Be Prepared: A Weather | Everyday Balloons | 2 March

According to this recent item at Williamette Week's Local Cut blog, superlative slowcore combo A Weather will issue its sophomore set Everyday Balloons March 2 on the Team Love label. The set -- 11 tracks deep -- is apparently more guitar-heavy, which sounds like a good thing, although the tension and restraint of the band's first set was one of its strongest features. We know that "Lay Me Down" in the track listing posted below is not a cover of Grateful Dead's "To Lay Me Down," although we think it would be amazing if A Weather decided to take that on (as we've said before). The Portland, Ore-based quintet has continued a tradition of releasing a holiday track, and this year it offers at its MySpace cabin and on Williamette Week's Another Grey Christmas 3 comp a version of the standard "Baby, It's Cold Outside." Last year's track was "Winter Wonderland," which we are posting below. We reviewed A Weather's 2008 debut Cove here, and named it one of the best records of the rapidly waning decade here.

A Weather -- "Winter Wonderland" -- 2008 Williamette Week holiday compilation
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[buy A Weather music from Newbury Comics right here]

Everyday Balloons:

1. Third of Life
2. Winded
3. Ducks
4. Seven Blankets
5. Midday Moon
6. Newfallen
7. No Big Hope
8. Fond
9. Happiness
10. Giant Stairs
11. Lay Me Down

The Warlocks: Through The Looking Glass The Hard Way

We didn't know anything about The Warlocks -- except wasn't that name the original name for the Grateful Dead? -- until hearing the L.A.-based quintet's absolutely sublime tune "Dreamless Days" on WMBR a couple years back. Since then -- and since buying Heavy Deavy Skull Lover, from which "Dreamless Days" was taken -- our affinity for the band has grown steadily. The Mirror Explodes, The Warlocks' sixth record, is available in the UK today and will be released in the U.S. on Tee Pee Records tomorrow. The opening track "Red Camera" begins like a dangerously overdriven version of the title track to Mazzy Star's So Tonight That I Might See, but then floats into dark electric curtains of white noise and feedback. The record is not uniformly weighty: the ballad "There Is a Formula To Your Despair" is distinctly more gentle, although perhaps only a little less narcotic. The Warlocks launch a two-week UK tour July 14, after hitting Paris July 10; U.S. dates have not been revealed. Download "Red Camera" below.

The Warlocks -- "Red Camera" -- The Mirror Explodes
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[video]
[buy Warlocks records from Newbury Comics right here]

A Weather Recording Follow-Up To 2008 Standout Cove

[A note to readers: with our new family commitments we will institute some changes here. One of these is the shelving of the Today's Hotness feature, which collected newsworthy items into an amalgamated post. Instead we will run more shorter items as we are able to churn them out. Here is the first. -- Ed.]

Portland, OR-based slowcore stars A Weather have spent recent weeks recording a new set that may see release before year-end. The quintet has laid down tracks in its home town at the studio Type Foundry, and as recently as Friday fronter Aaron Gerber tweeted that he was working on vocals for the planned set. There are few details to be had about the new set at this point, but it will include the track "Lay Me Down," according to another tweet. We can only hope this is a cover of Grateful Dead's "To Lay Me Down." Come to think of it, we recall Cowboy Junkies doing a very good cover of that track for the Deadicated comp in the '90s. We'll have to track that down again. The new A Weather set is unlikely to be ready for public consumption before fall or winter, so in the meantime continue to play the excellent Cove to death. That record, in case you don't recall, was one of our favorites of 2008. Read our review here.

Something we've had on our list of things to write about for months and months is three A Weather demos submitted to and made available to the Interwebs by Fat Cat Records. The tracks, which we believe were recorded by Mr. Gerber whilst he was still at Hampshire College in Western Massachusetts, include two versions of "Still Talk" -- one digitally sliced, diced and Animal Collective-ized and the other acoustic -- and "Tonight I Am Letting You Drive." The tracks are memorable, but the digitally tweaked version of the former is sufficiently different from the material on Cove to imbue it with distinctive intrigue. The three tunes are alternately attributed to A. Sweater and Sweater Weather, monikers that are certainly early ruminations on the name that ultimately framed the quintet. Here's "Tonight I Am Letting You Drive."

A. Sweater -- "Tonight I Am Letting You Drive" -- Music For Six Twilights
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[buy A Weather music from the band here]

06/27 -- The Doug Fir -- Portland, OR
07/12 -- The Backstage Lounge -- Vancouver, BC

Today's Hotness: Up Up Down Down, Bad Brains, The Monkees

>> Aloha readers. Please be advised that we're going to be off-line for the rest of June, as we've got a bit of sun and fun lined up. Don't worry, we won't be totally rock free, as we've got biographies of John Lydon and Frank Zappa already thrown in the suitcase. Expect your :: clicky clicky :: service to resume July 1.

>> We've been spinning Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start's new long player Worst Band Name Ever trying to come up with an angle for a review since it came in the mail. In the meantime, the band has posted two MP3s from the set at its MySpace carport and at the sorta new, sorta not web site for the record here. One of the posted tunes is "I'll Thank You Later," the video of which we already posted here last month. We're more excited that the band has posted "The Red Loop," however, because it is one of our two favorite tracks from the hilariously titled new collection. Murmered, harmonized vocals drift over a bed of pounding toms and hard-panned, dueling acoustic guitars, and as always songwriter Steve Poponi's structurally beautiful simplicity. Two verses, two choruses, two minutes and twenty four seconds. Download both tracks below.

Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start -- "I'll Thank You Later" -- Worst Band Name Ever
Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start -- "The Red Loop" -- Worst Band Name Ever
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[for a boat-load more free MP3s and to order UUDD records, hit this link]

>> Pun Canoes is streaming the title track to hardcore progenitors Bad Brain's forthcoming reunion album Build A Nation. It's pretty one dimensional, but that one dimension is heavy. Stream "Build A Nation" here. Build A Nation was produced by Beastie Boy Adam Yauch and will be released June 26.

>> Things we didn't know or already forgot: Rhino is reissuing double-disc, deluxe editions of The Monkees' Headquarters and Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. If you order them both directly from Rhino you will receive two unreleased tracks from 1967 on a limited edition vinyl single with a picture sleeve. More details here. If you click around you will see that Rhino previously issued similar deluxe editions of The Monkees and More Of The Monkees at some point along the way. Is it true The Monkees outsold The Beatles and The Rolling Stones between 1966 and 1968? Did we read that right?

>> Since we've opened the door on our musical past by mentioning The Monkees above, we may as well also note something else we found very interesting. Fifteen years after releasing the first two parts of its From The Vault series, the Grateful Dead organization has finally seen fit to release the third volume. Three From The Vault streets June 26, and we are sure all of you will throw it right in your shopping carts next to that Bad Brains joint. More information right here. Mrs. Clicky Clicky actually got us a cool DVD featuring the Grateful Dead performing on Tom Snyder's talk show in 1980. The performances were to promote the release of the excellent Dead set Reckoning. The interview portion, which pairs Jerry Garcia with Ken Kesey, was really, really amusing.