The first questions that come to mind before even spinning the record are something like: Have the years changed the band much? Did they embrace electronics or go acoustic or buy a bunch of fuzz pedals? The answers come during the first notes of the opening song, "Where Are We Now?" The band sounds pretty much like it did in the late '90s. It went so well that the band (the original trio of Mike Kinsella, Steve Holmes, and Steve Lamos plus Mike's brother Nate on bass) decided to return to the studio and make an album, which they again titled American Football. In 2014, the members of American Football reunited to play a series of shows around the world to all the people who had been touched so deeply by their album originally and over the many years since its release. Even the projects headed up later by the band's own Mike Kinsella weren't able to fully recapture that elusive feeling. In the years since, other bands came close to reaching the tender soft-focus heights that the band reached, but nobody ever managed to find the same blend of innocent technical proficiency and openhearted melodic grace that's both compelling and peaceful at its core. Since American Football broke up soon after the release of their self-titled 1999 album, it felt like their one and only release was some kind of magical occurrence that existed at the point where math rock, post-rock, emo, and confessional singer/songwriter all coincided.
0 kommentar(er)
