When I first played Chin Up Chin Up’s new album “We Should Have Never Lived Liked We Were Skyscrapers” I was so not impressed. At best I figured this CD could be decent background music. Nothing you would really want to listen to, but something you won’t go out of your way to turn off. But I know better, I’ve liked tons of really shitty CDs the first time I listened to them. So CUCU as they are going to be known the rest of the way gets a second chance.
“We Should Have Never Lived Liked We Were Skyscrapers,” is the first full-length album for the Chicago natives-in 2002 they released a self-titled EP.
While they toiled away in obscurity writing and performing what would be come CUCU’s indie pop meets art-house rock masterpiece, tragedy struck. Bassist Chris Saathoff was killed in a tragic hit-and-run after a show, when the time was right the rest of the guys soldiered on. They sliced and diced through several disks of recordings of Saathoff’s, using some of their fallen comrades pre-recorded bass lines they were able to complete the final six songs on the album. Emotional scars and posthumous bass lines permeate this deeply sad though resiliently optimistic album.
There was something about the music on the CD that really drew me in. There is something really familiar and noble about it. They aren’t the evil clones of any other bands, but the sounds they are producing are sweet and intimate.
CUCU has tapped into a sound that is so hardwired into the collective consciences of anyone willing to listen, politely forcing them to keep listening.
What is cool about this CD are the types of sounds that are the glue that keeps virtually all of the tracks together; the finger snapping during “Get Me Off This Fucking Island” or the space ship warming up sounds from the beginning of “All My Hammocks Are Dying”, were there to make the song better not just for the sake of being weird or ironic.
Last week I had my most indie rock moment, in a really long time. I’m taking NYC’s L train into work, I’m listening to CUCU, and reading some bizarre book about some weird Christmas cult and a former male model turned President, but I digress. So I’m listening to the CD, and pretty much out of nowhere I am so into it. This disc has upgraded itself from milk-toast background music, to music to take out and try to convert the masses.
Anyway As I’m sitting there, listening to the wall of sounds that is “I hope for tumbleweeds” I realize that the train hasn’t moved in twenty minutes or so. I didn’t really care, I switched over to repeat, leaned my head back and enjoyed. |