These are all bands I know. And when I say, “know,” I mean “recorded their EP” and “they were best-men at my wedding” kinda know. All, that is, except for one, who I’d say were acquaintances, and at the time of writing, email ones at that. So doubt my credibility if you will, but don’t shoot the message just ‘cause the messenger gets into all their gigs for free.
To be honest though, I’ve never actually gotten to see Murder Mystery in the flesh. (I have seen photos from their EP and website, but I think they’ve been generously Photoshopped.) You can see them though, should you be in NYC on the 20th of Feb, playing at Pianos with Sono Oto, where it’s likely you’ll get to hear “Love Astronaut.” The clean guitar melody preceding the verse and the chunky rhythm laid down by the rhythm section provide the impetus—the keyboard arpeggio provides the levity, the “bah bah baahs” joyously fortifying the point. Recorded in high-definition black and white by JP Bowersock (Ryan Adams, The Strokes first EP), “Love Astronaut” has the distinction of being unavailable for purchase by nature of the fact it’s the first track completed from their still-in-progress debut album. And keeping it in the family, I thought I’d let you hear it here first.
Pine’s “Hosanna” isn’t available yet either. It will be though, on the Twelve Hour Collision EP due for release this month. Pine’s M.O. is distilled indie-pop delivered intravenously via three-piece sans bass. It takes effect pretty much from the first hit, but unlike, I don’t know, say, heroin, the lifestyle repercussions are far less serious. In fact, “serious” is the last thing you could accuse Pine of being. Sure, the fuzzy 6/4-guitar riff and multi-tracked vocal layers through the chorus and outro could be considered arch attempts at cerebral posturing by those of a cynical disposition. However such heady thoughts are easily proscribed, and if Hannah Beehre’s beauté minimize vocals don’t do that, if anything, “Hosanna” asks only for two minutes of your attention and rewards you with endorphins that last much longer.
Minuit, on the other hand, expect you to work for your natural high. Which is not to say the music they make is inaccessible in any way, just that their preferred delivery device is the club floor rather than the speakers on your iBook. Having just completed a breviloquent tour of Europe, during which Adam Freeland proclaimed them to be “utter genius” (or something like that, I forget), Minuit’s double sampler and cantatrice approach apparently had Berliner audiences dancing throughout the night with only severe hangovers as collateral damage. But if the thought of outing yourself as rhythmically inept in public proves unpalatable, “Fuji” (taken from The Guards Themselves), with its sonic weave of incursive bass, continental breakbeats and Ruth Carr’s didactic vocal inflections, will have those in the post-Maxinquaye bracket discovering visceral gratification really is achievable from the comfort and anonymity of your own home. Oh, and by the way, it’s pronounced “Min-wee.”