Vee Vee

Archers of Loaf

Alias

6.March.1995

Continuing our review of the entire Archers of Loaf catalog in preparation for their impending reunion tour, we bring you a lenghty review of the second full-length record.

This is, to me, the quintessential Archers of Loaf record.  It is their classic, and in fact is one of the high points of 1990s indie rock.  It's one of those records that i just pull down and listen to every once in a while just for the heck of it.  To me, this is a fun album to play and bounce along with during the long Southern summers.  It's a fun, energetic album to play with friends.

So, unlike the previous two releases that i have reviewed, this is the one Archers record i am still familiar with.  I know every word and note on the damned thing.

Vee Vee is also the first fully Archers of Loaf record. that is to say, When i go back and listen to records that preceded this one, i hear a young band sorting through their influences to make their own way. On Vee Vee Eric Bachman has figured out who he is a song writer, and started crafting tunes that are little stories, almost like folk-songs. The rest of the band, for their part, have realized that there is more to life than heavy metal and hardcore punk. Vee Vee is a record of long, stretched out meandering jams that last minutes, the band just playing around and having fun. Sure, the old touchstones are there, but this is new.

It starts, appropriately enough, with Step Into the Light a song that begins with a long, meandering guitar intro with the band singing "ooh" lightly. Then Eric Bachman sings, clearly and quietly, not growling or yelling, just sort of lightly speaking the words as the guitars spiral with more "ooh"-ing. It's really a pretty song, and indicative of the new direction the band are going in.

And then, with a clattering of guitar chords and a shouted "Two!", the Archers tear into what i think is their best song, the classic Harnessed In Slums. One of my fondest memories of any live show ever is seeing Superchunk at The Echo Lounge back in 1999 with Eric Bachman's Crooked Fingers project opening, and on the encore Bachman took Jim Wilbur's guitar, Wilbur grabbed the mic, leaned out over the crowd, and Superchunk tore into this song with a couple hundred drunk indie rockers bouncing up and down like crazy and screaming along with the words: "Thugs and scum and punks and freaks / Are harnessed in slums but they want to be free!" This is one of my favorite rock songs of the 1990s, a real anthem: upbeat, fast and catchy.

The next song starts, inexplicably, with that high-pitched sound of a truck backing up. Nevermind the Enemy, is a great poppy tune with odd noise on the chorus. I must confess that i always thought the backing voice on the chorus was another band member yelling incoherently, but since i put this record on my Zune and have been listening to it on headphones, i discovered that the weird vocal noise is, apparently, Eric Bachman's voice backwards masked. I wonder what he is saying on this hidden message? (Brendan's Note: Paul's dead?) Anyway, i like the guitars here, which chime in two melodic lines.

Then comes Greatest of All Time which, oddly enough, was not on the EP that it shares a title with. That's strange, but this is a damned great song that starts off slowly, almost hesitantly as Bachman croons "They caught and drowned the front man, of the world's worst rock and roll band" in a paranoid self-deprecating moment. The song builds with a loping beat to a noisy climax of clattering guitars as Bachman tells a strange story about rock stardom. It ends with Bachman chanting "The underground is overcrowded" in a strangely prophetic moment.

Underdogs of Nipomo is the most angular song on this record, the closest The Archers get to math-rock on this album, and yet they still seem to make it feel catchy. Angular, clattering guitars with an upbeat melody.

Floating Friends is a pop song with a nice chanted chorus. I think on this song the non-Bachman voices are clearest, or maybe it is just that his voice is fuzzy and lost in the guitar fog.

1985 is a strange interlude of organ and guitar feedback, almost like something from Bachman's Barry Black project. It serves as a good buffer zone, protecting the previous couple of pop tunes from the hardcore riffing that is to come next.

Fabricoh almost reminds me of Sick File off of Icky Mettle, a sort of drunken fast riffed punk anthem, while Nostalgia is just the band channeling Black Flag at their most primal, all power chords and shouting. I suppose that is appropriate for them, since as a group they are likely to be nostalgic for the hardcore punk of their teenage years. Both of these tunes seem to be here to remind you that they are the same band that made Icky Mettle, and that's fine.

Death in the Park is next, and is a slower song with nice guitar interplay. Here Bachman stretches his lyrical muscles, singing, "Always the same people pissing the same people off". He can be witty when he wants to be.

It's back to the hardcore for The Worst Has Yet To Come, a few minutes of angry fast guitarwork and yelling, and then things get really weird. The album ends with the awesomely titled Underachievers March and Fight Song, which is the silliest song the Archers have done up until this point in their career, and maybe even afterwards. There is a plinking of what sounds like banjo, horns, and group whistling, all wrapped around a happy little melody. Good to know that they were not taking things too seriously...

Label: http://www.aliasrecords.com/
Artist: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archers_of_Loaf
http://www.archersofloaf.com/
http://www.myspace.com/archersofloaf
http://www.aliasrecords.com/archersofloaf.htm
http://www.webinfront.com/ (fan site)
Also on EvilSponge:
   Album: Icky Mettle
   EP: Vs. The Greatest of All Time
   Compilation: The Speed of Cattle
   Album: All the Nations Airports
   Album: White Trash Heroes
   Live Album: Seconds before the Accident