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The Dying Falls -- Driftwood

There is something magical in the display and rendering of nostalgia. The Dying Fall’s LP, Driftwood, channels nostalgia from every pore and every crevasse. The album plays as a myriad of send offs: homages to lost loves, depression, childhood, teenagers. Even the overall background sound of the album sounds old. The Dying Falls create a unique, but very familiar underground sound. The title track “Youth Goes Bad,” plays like a dusty old Talking Heads album cut. Throughout Driftwood, there is a strong underground presence very similar to the kind shown in the eighties. Echoes of Sonic Youth and The Pixies are spread across this album, “Old Prisoner’s Song” in particular seems to have crawled right out of 1987.

There are several songs that feel unique simply to The Dying Falls. “The Sun Shines For Everyone (But Not For Me),” sounds wholly original. The most spontaneous and loudest track (in terms of original identity) would be the album closer “Injury.” “Injury” clicks right off the bat, and the sound that comes off this song, needs to be duplicated in later efforts by The Dying Falls. Driftwood is an album of nostalgic and underground charm.--Casey Lowrey

 
February 2012
Friendly People
Friendly People EP

mp3

Friendly People’s debut, self-titled 3-song EP gives a concise taste of a promising young Cambridge, MA-based band. Their jangly indie pop is peppered with hints of Americana, roots rock and folk with vocals that owe a debt to Neil Young. The EP’s clear highlight is its opening track—their namesake song—“Friendly People”. It’s a tremendous, positive track buoyed by a horn section in the bridge which lends a mariachi feel. “A Lot of Work To Do” brings out Harvest-era Neil Young, starting as a plaintive acoustic ditty which builds slowly into a passionate electric number. Closing track, “Branches”, follows the same acoustic-to-electric path. As the song builds, it introduces tribal rhythms that are reminiscent of 80s indie-punk legends, the Volcano Suns. Friendly People are scheduled to record their debut full-length in March. If the Friendly People EP is indicative of what we can expect from this young group’s next batch of tunes it will be a record to keep an eye on later in 2012.--George Dow

 
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