Review: Dikembe | Broad Shoulders

The emo and punk scene in Gainesville, Florida has been vibrant for so very long that this blog's executive editor lost a bass player to the lure of the student mecca some 12 years ago. Dude left BOSTON -- Piebald's Boston, The Wicked Farleys' Boston -- to go to Gainesville; this really happened. Anyway, based on the strength of the debut full-length from the southern city's latest export, Gainesville's gravitational pull on the perennial population of earnest indie and hardcore kids is likely to grow yet stronger as people inevitably turn on to the brilliant emo foursome Dikembe. The fiery quartet's new album Broad Shoulders, released Tuesday by Tiny Engines (a small label whose A&R is uneffwithable), is crammed with melodic, gritty anthems concerned with the regrets and resignations that accompany coming of age. Channeled through a textural, two-guitar attack and nailed down by a charged rhythm section that pounds time to the band's punk heart, the 10 songs on Broad Shoulders crackle with energy as intensely as they ache with honest sentiment.

The collection's comfort zone is the heads-down punk boogie of jams like "Apology Not Fucking Accepted" and the ode to Gainesville "We Could Become River Rats," but Dikembe's playing is so dextrous and songwriting so well-developed that Broad Shoulders is free of tired punk and emo tropes. The scritchy guitar tone and mournful repetition of album highlight "Not Today, Angel" recalls very early Portastatic, but the rhythm section breathes a glow onto the ballad's slow burn. Melodic guitar leads arc above gathering clouds of feedback while fronter Steven Gray murmurs his incantation, his wishing away of his corroded relationship with his dad; the chorus is buttressed by a curious, canned beat buried among the song's soft, blanket-like folds. "Not Today, Angel" is a small moment of stillness on a record that otherwise shakes with energy. The relentlessly propulsive groove of "I Watch A Lot Of Jackie Chan Movies" -- which feels like it could crescendo at any moment, but just ends up eating its own tail -- echoes slithering grinds similar to those turned out these days by Western, Mass.-based indie heroes Speedy Ortiz. Stream "Jackie Chan" and a few other selections from the album via the Soundcloud embed below.

Broad Shoulders is clearly excellent on its own merits, but it is especially gratifying for those of us still lamenting the demise of late, great Brooklyn indie punks Meneguar, who quietly called it quits in 2008 after releasing its third record, the fairly weird The In Hour (the debut I Was Born At Night and 2007's Strangers In Our House, however, are stone-cold classics). So to Meneguar fans we say, "have no fear, your ship has finally come in." Broad Shoulders was released Aug. 14 on limited edition 12" and digital download and is available for purchase right here. The vinyl comes in an edition of 500 pieces, 100 of which are clear "with blue smoke," 150 dark orange and 250 light brown. Dikembe's long player was preceded by the free, digital-only EP Chicago Bowls, which was released in 2011 and is still available for free download right here.

Dikembe: Bandcamp | Facebook | Soundcloud | YouTube

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Today's Hotness: CNC, Van Gumby, Portastatic

[PHOTO CREDIT: Zuzia Skoczek] >> As our 2003 trashing of the debut by poptrash audioporn puppets T.A.T.U. suggests, we are interested in learning about music scenes in non-English-speaking countries. So we were eager to listen to Polish shoegaze duo CNC when we received a pitch from their organization late last year announcing the November release of the new EP No Mood. The band casts itself as "shoegaze psych-pop" (its MySpace blurb charmingly promises "same f*cking riff again"), and we suppose that is a pretty apt description, although we hear elements of straight guitar pop in "Magenta Ants" and even Darla Records-styled ambient trip-hop (Junior Varsity KM, Sweet Trip) in the icy gleam of the droning title track. About CNC we know little. The act is comprised of Borys Dejnarowicz (also a principal behind CNC's label Draw Records) and Piotr Maciejewski, and we're told its music isn't typical of what is going on in Polish popular music (since they are a shoegaze band, this does not surprise us, after all, where is shoegaze typical?). Typical or not, we think there are more than enough sparkling moments to warrant recommending to your attention No Mood. CNC has permitted us to offer a teaser, so we are posting below the title track.

CNC -- "No Mood" -- No Mood
[right click and save as]
[buy No Mood from one of these various outlets 1, 2, 3, 4]

>> On the day that we read of Gumby creator Art Clokey's death, we received our second email missive from Florida-based indie pop quartet Van Gumby. Odd coincidence. We had been mildly intrigued by Van Gumby's prior release "Mostly Chimp," but had doubts as to whether the home-spun-sounding production effectively presented the combo's music. Van Gumby's new EP She Has Arrived is a sonic step forward, and the four songs clearly benefit from clearer production. The title track, written in London in 2008, is a mid-tempo strummer appointed with a surf guitar lead that will fit nicely into your picnic playlist once warmer weather arrives (it is 21 degrees fahrenheit in Cambridge, Mass., as we type this). The second track "Astrogirl" is an acoustic ballad with tons of phaser on the vocal. The phaser is a little distracting, but the Oberst-y vocal, synth and melodica make up for it. The highlight of the four tunes is "Seasons Go" (co-written by band fronter Spencer Tricker and Shomik Chakrabarti) which recreates the chiming electric guitar lead over acoustic strumming that underpinned the title track, but with more insistent pacing and a weary vibe that reminds us of some of our favorite Okay Paddy tracks (Van Gumby cites Teenage Fanclub, Stone Roses and Blur as influences on this latest collection). You can stream the entire She Has Arrived EP at the Van Gumby Bandcamp page right here, at which page you may also purchase tracks for a price of your choosing. Van Gumby has graciously allowed us to offer "Seasons Go," so have a listen.

Van Gumby -- "Seasons Go" -- She Has Arrived EP
[right click and save as]
[download/purchase Van Gumby releases here]

>> While we expect you have seen this file all over the Interzizzles by now, we couldn't ignore the fact that Portastatic has released a free download of its cover of Destroyer's amazing "Foam Hands." The original was one of our top songs of 2008. Merge Records is selling the track as part of Portastatic's Make It Sound In Tune digital-only covers EP, the proceeds of which will go to benefit certain charities selected by subscribers to the SCORE! subscription service.

Portastatic -- "Foam Hands" -- Make It Sound In Tune EP
[right click and save as]
[purchase various Portastatic musics right here]

Today's Hotness: Muxtape Numero Dos, Silver Jews, MySpace Music

>> New Muxtape "STEADY NOW DON'T FALL APART" up tonight here. Again, we were hugely frustrated by the amount of our digital collection that we ripped in AAC. We had really intended to start this mix off with "Cadali" by The Coctails, which is a truly unparalleled beauty of a pop song. But we didn't feel like re-ripping it. Well, now we're changing our mind, because it's really that good. Hold on. Sorry Bikini Kill's "For Tammy Rae," you just got bumped. Anyway, our notes are below.

1. The Coctails -- "Cadali" -- The Coctails
(makes us think of walking past the library and to WESU on a cold winter's day and realizing there's only so long you can ignore the elephant in the room)

2. California Snow Story -- "Suddenly Everything Happens" -- single
(immediately gripping, powerfully melancholy)

3. Barnabys -- "Gargamel" -- Jiffy Boy Records' 10 Cent Fix comp
(so many guitars, so much sitting with legs crossed knowing there's no real reason etc. etc. etc.)

4. Chapterhouse -- "Breather" -- Whirlpool
(sleeper track for us from one of the most important mix tapes we ever received, given to us by a guy who now owns sheep and doesn't really follow music anymore)

5. Daylight's For The Birds -- "To No One" -- Trouble Everyday
(pretty, cinematic, captivating singer)

6. Mobius Band -- "Frozen Lake In Unison" -- Three EP
(those early self-released EPs from Mobius Band are no joke. this song always makes our ears perk up when it shuffles into the mix)

7. Happy Mondays -- "Bob's Yer Uncle" -- Thrills, Pills and Bellyaches
(another classic mix tape cut from a tape received from a different guy who now lives in the middle of nowhere and doesn't really follow music anymore. this song distinguishes itself as being the only Happy Mondays track we enjoy. it occurs to us that the secret theme of this mix might be flute)

8. Jawbreaker -- "Rich" -- Hardcore Breakout USA
(we came to this band late, despite everyone raving in the '90s. we came to this song even later, but it is certainly one of Jawbreaker's best, right up there with "Chesterfield Kings")

9. Finger -- "Ship Full Of Holes" -- Jettison 18 single
(North Carolina act whose single we bought probably because of an ad in the back of Spin or maybe in a hard copy catalog from Alias or Merge or Jettison or Antenna or one of those Carolina labels. All of which reminds us we don't have any Connells in CD or digital form. We'll have to remedy that. This one's a pretty straight rocker, enjoyable nonetheless)

10. Portastatic -- "Look, Honey, Peaches" -- A Day In The Park compilation
(the epitome of sad, lovestruck Mac, in our opinion. Portastatic is too band-y and glossy for us nowadays, and whenever a new set comes out we long for more numbers like this and the stuff on Slow Note From A Sinking Ship)

>> Example of the commutative property of mathematics: we love Babar the Elephant; the cover of the forthcoming Silver Jews record has Babar on it; therefore we love the cover of the forthcoming Silver Jews record, which is titled Lookout Mountain, Lookout Sea. Pantsfork has all the details here.

>> This Wired.com piece contains all the details about the planned MySpace Music service. And you know what? It all sounds boring. Perhaps if MySpace founder Chris DeWolfe offered more than the sort of boasts that a more critical reporter would not accept at face value. Wired touts the interview as "in-depth," but the piece reads more like an email interview conducted by an inexperienced blogger without the chutzpah to challenge DeWolfe's marketing-speak.