The Casket Letters - Monkey Swallows the Universe

Track list:

1. Statutory Rights
2. Bloodline
3. Science
4. Matterhoney
5. Gravestones
6. Little Polveir
7. Elizabeth & Mary
8. Ballad of the Breakneck Bride
9. Paper, Scissors, Stone
10. When the Work Is Done

Running time: 34 minutes
Released: 2007

When I listened to The Bright Carvings whilst in the US for work earlier in the year I said I hoped I would make it to this one this year. I have, just later than I might have expected. I have fond memories of this album... though I think it is probably more accurate to say that I really like Bloodline. If I am lucky there might be some interest in the tracks around it.

We open with a whimsical little number, a nice lyrical quality to the singing and a simple but pleasant tune to back it up. The vocal is the driver here, low in volume and sounding hopeful, the longer notes are lovely. Then we launch into the catchy opening of Bloodline, with a tappable tune that has stuck in my head for the past decade. I occasionally come back to this one now and again. It has a nice pace, a catchy hook, and a really nice vocal. With more mature ears it sounds very youthful and a little vapid but the catchiness is still there and it inveigled its way in to my consciousness long ago enough now that it is well established. I can hear that its a little light in places - further arrangement of the strings would have added something I think - but the crescendo to the chorus is a heartstring-tugger, and the singing is delightful. It ends rather abruptly, and there is nothing of similar interest to follow, alas.

Science ditches the tempo, but gains a little more life after it reaches the chorus. This takes indiepop and dials it up to tweelve. I do like the cello providing the bassline though, and the song grows into itself a little as it goes. I knew very well what I was getting into on this listen.

One of the things I find about indiepop is that it is incredibly mood dependent. If you're in a mood to not take things too seriously it will sound better. There are (generally) too many holes to really delve into and pick apart if you start looking for flaws. Thankfully I'm content enough to just rol with it tonight. This album runs a gamut of different tempos and tones, but most are slowish, and the best sounds are when our singer is soft and central. Nat Johnson's voice suits a light touch song - just a little stringy noodling - very well. Bloodline doesn't really make the most of her voice, but brings much more interest in catchiness to make up for this and elevate the track as a whole. Some of the other tracks though, the only interest at all is in that voice.

Oh, I'd forgotten just how charmingly disarming Little Polveir can be. The arrangement is twee out the wazoo, but at the same time it is so approachable and it supports Johnson's voice well. I'm less keen on the wordless section, but it it just a small part of a whole that should fall right down, but somehow stays afloat. I had completely forgotten the tone-change that follows - much darker sounds, electrified and a more OTT "look at me" vocal. The contrast with what has gone before is interesting, but I actually find that the threatening rumble in the guitars doesn't work that well here. I think that is because the pace is actually quite slow, and there isn't much intricacy to the growl.

To exemplify the tonal shifting around, the next number is a lyrically dark ditty with a twangy tune that stretches the tweeness and insouciance too far. The male/female duet approach doesn't work that well either, as the male voice just isn't a good one.

I am struggling to think this was only released in 2007; it feels older than that. You can tell they were pretty young, too. Listening now, in my mid 30s, feels oddly voyeuristic in some ways as a result. My laissez-faire attitude to the disc has suddenly evaporated. I'm not feeling the charm anymore. The record is over. I consider wielding the knife but stay my hand out of nostalgia.

The Bright Carvings - Monkey Swallows the Universe

Track list:

1. Sheffield Shanty
2. Martin
3. Jimmy Down the Well
4. The Chicken Fat Waltz
5. Down
6. You Yesterday
7. Wallow
8. 22
9. Fonz You!
10. Still
11. Beautiful Never

Running time: 37 minutes
Released: 2006

Did someone ask for twee indiepop? No? Too bad, that's up next. I suspect this album is pretty bad, though I think Monkey Swallows the Universe had some pretty catchy little tunes on the follow-up (The Casket Letters). I had that before this, and the only song here I can bring to mind before I start is less than great. Still - prejudice is bad, mmkay?

It starts far more promisingly than my introduction. A neat little guitar part and an understated vocal. It has a slightly disheveled feel to it - a late night stumbling home feel. Suitable; my clock says 00:44 though it is really a fair bit earlier than that. After 2 busy nights I had this one to myself and I have gratefully retreated into music rather than explore after dark. Weird moment when we get a bit of Paul Simon lyrics chucked into the middle of the opening song. Trying to be clever and referential falls down when it is such blatant wholesale stealing, but I rather like the overall tone this opener sets.

The slightly higher pace in the guitar line of Martin reminds me of Thea Gilmore, but the vocal isn't as good and the song bottoms out pretty early. The chorus has a nice structure but the playing is functional rather than engaging and the vocal is missing something intangible - not through lack of ability, more the wrong context. This tune fits twee, where twee is used as a tarring brush, whereas the one that follows is just plain... ugh. A trite little number that deserves no credit (indeed I saw a set at a festival once where Jimmy Down the Well was used as a stick to beat the drummer with by his new - less successful! - band). It doesn't get any better after that finishes either, as the tune that follows is all over the place.

Sheffield Shanty was clearly giving a false impression; the rest of the disc thus far is pretty much exactly what I imagined it would be. The sense I get is that the band hadn't matured to find their sound at this point, but by the time they did, they had decided to part ways. I will get to The Casket Letters later this year (I hope) and unless my memory is playing tricks on me - a common theme, I know - the quality exhibited there is much higher.

You Yesterday has something slightly more interesting about it, but it is raw and unpolished. Vocal a little too flat, chords snatched, janky, levels not quite set. Its an interesting (and quick) little diversion, and then Wallow has a much better tone to it. A sense of purpose in the playing - two different guitar tunes interweaving well - and a vocal that is more like something I want to listen to. I really like the edginess that the repeated note striking on one of the guitars gives and the snatchy, speedy little hook. Best thing on the disc so far, although that isn't saying too much.

After a quick break to rinse out my ears (ew!) I set about 22, the little acoustic riff and glockenspiel combination falls flat for me as it starts, and the fuller sound of the mature track does nothing to win me back. It isn't that the song is bad, it just fails to be compelling, doesn't offer anything to arrest the ear and demand attention. The growth of the track, strings and other arrangement added, could be really nice in another context, but it lost me early. That goes much for the punchier Fonz You! too. It feels like music composed for a less than serious montage on TV or something. Maybe someone riding a bike, but unable to go in a straight line or stay upright. There's some whistling though, which is the first time I recall hearing that as part of the music (rather than a crowd reaction) outside of Andrew Bird records.

Final two tracks. Still is frustrating almost immediately, it has elements I really like in the vocal and some of the long extended, modulated notes of the melody, but the two do not sound like they are working together to me. The same sense persists through the song, which really only comprises those two things... and that only serves to make the frustration more acute. I think on balance I forgive it, but only just. The final track is the longest of them, at 6 minutes. It is sombre by comparison, whilst keeping the voice plus guitar limit. I get the sense they were trying to ape someone else here but I cannot place whom. It seems, too, that the 6 minutes is a lie as the song fades out after 2 and a half.  The stupid hidden track arrives a minute later and surprises with a male singing voice, and not a great one at that. The lyrics are amusing enough I guess, but the butchering of them is painful to behold.

Yes, this was pretty weak; not quite a complete write off but near to it; they got better, though.