Whenever a song goes from lower case to ALL CAPS, the Silversun Pickups will be there.
Whenever a young band names themselves after a liquor store, the Silversun Pickups will be there.
Whenever a comparison to Kurt Cobain becomes a backhanded compliment, the Silversun Pickups will be there.
Whenever singing like Kim Deal becomes a bad thing - because you’re a dude - the Silversun Pickups will be there.
Whenever a band doesn’t recognize their own song being played at a bar or forgets to attend their own after show party, the Silversun Pickups will be there.
Among empties of Jameson’s and back issues of Cat Fancy magazine (their blue tuxedoed cat, Cawliflower says, “Hey”) the Silversun Pickups revamped some of their old songs (got into it with their producer Dave Cooley (QOTS) and wrote the ‘strangers’ (new songs) that would become Carnavas.
Unlike last years EP Pikul, Carnavas was recorded in a studio. Cooley insisted. And while the new recording lacks its predecessor’s blurry-with-beauty Monet-ess, Carnavas’ slicker - dare I say fancier – production quality suits the Silversun Pickups gradually maturing Wall Of Sound.
Front man Brian Aubert, bassist/singer Nikki Monninger, keyboardist Joe Lester, well-hydrated drummer Christopher Guanlao (his ‘water’ actually is water – crazy…) and occasional cellist Tanya Haden have been together since 2002. 2000, if you count the years before Lester and Guanlao joined. SSPU are part of the The Ship collective that also harbors Earlimart and the Silversun Pickups personal music video director Suzie Vlcek.
Late bloomers - Carnavas is the Silversun Pickups very first full length.
Ah, Carnavas. All the Silversun Pickups’ registered TM’s are here: the five minute songs you can lose yourself in, that indefinable transient quality, “The Fuzz” (“Melatonin”) the ever present quiet/loud and the pretty /fugly, along with a newfound love for guitar crunchery (“Future Foe Scenarios”), tricked out keys (“Little Lover’s So Polite”) and beats that make one want to send the drummer a care package (“Well Thought Out Twinkles”). Oh and Aubert’s “Dream At Tempo 119” Sebastian Bach fantasies…
Pikul had it’s own yin and yang, but the quiet prettiness had the upper hand. It was softness, relaxation, habit forming – a barbiturate if you will. Carnavas is its evil twin - harsh, relentless and opaque – the black sheep to Pikul’s little lamb. The ‘Go Inbetweens’ the EP and the full length was intentional, but hardly calculating. In fact Pikul was dedicated to a good friend who had passed, Doug “Pikul” Kratz. That’s enough to explain its relative gentility. As Aubert said in “Dream At Tempo 119 , “I couldn’t end it there...” |