Marnie Stern: In Advance of the Broken Arm (Kill Rock Stars)
Guitar-heroism propelled indie rock, with math rock tendencies. Crazy technically proficient guitar melodies, w/technicolor tapping, etc., but definitely not in metal vein. Guitar insanity forms structures of songs, rather than merely serving as self-indulgent detours like all those 80s hair metal prodigies, see? Mostly aggressive, but at times soft, female vox. Hella’s Zach Hill drums on this thing. This music kills…Stern manages to import math rock sensibilities into pop music, structuring mind melting guitar fury into cohesive, digestible songs (although the textural shifts are a little disorienting). Vox a little difficult to discern, although the bits that you can really hear deal w/vaguely metaphysical/poetic themes. No Fccs. Most tracks are high quality…but I like #1, 3, 13, 7 best, in that order.
1) 3:37 – FAST, intense finger tapping. Galloping percussion. Cool, manipulated gleeful vox...kinda shouts/not very melodic, but that’s not really the point. Catchy, relatively minimal (at times) lyrical lines. Ends kinda soft.
2) 2:47 – scratchy, angular rock. Mathy percussion. Aggressive. High fem vox.
3) 3:40 – catchy, midtempo staccato taps + vox. Cool vox melodic line. Pounding percussion. Last 20ish seconds kinda quiet. This song’s sweet…
4) 3:10 – Fast, intense math rock. So fast that it gets kinda numbing. Lots of mini-movements. Vox near end.
5) 2:41 – fun, poppy, intense, manic. Repetitive chorus.
6) 3:40 – loud distorted guitar squeals. Forms into a more cohesive song.
7) 3:21 – starts w/ vox, then furious tapping starts. Simple, sweet sing-song manipulated vox melody. Moves between weird various guitar/rhythmic textures.
8) 4:05 – guitar heroics you need the DSM-V to comprehend. Slows down to menacing pace for trippy vox.
9) 3:30 –starts w/ cheerleader vox + clapping. Driving punk rock. More cheerleader vox. Some reverby spoken-wordish sections.
10) 2:30 –super fast percussion. High guitar squeals. Aggressive; hollow. Some weird liquid vox manipulations. Math rock?
11) 3:30 –starts w/ odd spoken vox. Cool guitar melody. Math rock percussion. Neato vox manipulations. Complex vox layering.
12) 3:29 –starts kinda sinister w/percussion rolls, but then gets loud an’ fast an’ cool an’ etc. sections of weirdness return periodically.
13) 4:24 –mostly spoken-word meditation track, w/ electric guitar providing the sound effects for the hallucinations that Stern elicits with her hypno-therapy. I like her elocution. Surreal. Various guitar parts stack into a psychedelic stew. ½ half through driving, midtempo rock starts. Kinda epic feel...definitely a final track. “Go”.