Bandcamp Picks of the Week 6/21/17
Who’s afraid of our Big Bad Bandcamp Picks of the Week? Not you, hopefully.
Boston Marriage – PERSONAL SPACE
Genre: Indie Rock
Favorite Tracks: “Broken Down Boat,” “Sand,” “Rachel in the Dark Room”
Really all anyone can ask from their rock music is that it at least have some core convictions, and luckily, Florida-based Boston Marriage seems to have that going for them in spades. I say this over and over, but my biggest complaint about a whole swath of contemporary indie rock is its fear of actually showing emotion, and the PERSONAL SPACE EP skips over this completely. Bold and deeply rooted in its emotional integrity, PERSONAL SPACE is bolstered around singers Kris Lane and Melissa Pereira’s powerful vocals. Lazier critics would just compare the band to Diet Cig and Girlpool, but it’d be more accurate to compare them to their major influences: Modest Mouse and TRANSATLANTICISM-era Death Cab for Cutie. It’s not pretentious rock and it never fully crosses over into more hardcore aggression, but tracks like “Rachel in the Dark Room” demonstrate that this is a band that did not come here to fuck around. The track is propelled by Lisa Lapenna’s exceptional bass line that exudes a self-assured energy not always found on debut EPs. This is the kind of band you wish would blow up, and if they do, you can say you heard them here first. [Carter Moon]
Gallops – BRONZE MYSTIC
Genre: Experimental Rock
Favorite Tracks: “Pale Force,” “Crystal Trap,” “Darkjewel”
The U.K.-based Gallops burst onto the scene in 2012 with YOURS SINCERELY, DR. HARDCORE, a maelstrom of great guitar grooves and post-rock crescendos, but sadly broke up the following year. With renewed interest in colorful electronics, Gallops have returned, with a brighter, yet more expansive, sound. It’s great that the band’s time apart has not lessened their sense of musical adventure and discovery. Every song is unpredictable, revealing new sounds and textures over its entire run time without redundancy or fatigue setting in. Compositions and instrumentals are both incredibly dense, with numerous tempo and style changes within individual songs and layers upon layers of diverse synth work. There are still real drums and guitars that shine on the cool, tight groove that opens “Prince O,” and the reverb-soaked notes that provide a break in the lengthy “Darkjewel,” but they merely enhance the electronic core of the record. However, along with a transcendent sense of dramatic power and chaos, it is this fusion that prevents BRONZE MYSTIC from falling apart into a pile of electronic wankery and propels it into greatness. If your ideal music “merges the real with the unreal,” do not let this pass you by. [Blake Michelle]
