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It always seems weird to me when an old(er)
musical style that fell by the wayside
suddenly becomes popular again. The relevant
style here is "slowcore", a meandering pop
form from the late 1990s and early parts of
this century. I was into slowcore when it was
happening, and the early years of EvilSponge
are littered with reviews of those kinds of
bands.
And then it seemed to fade out for a while.
Heck, even Low
(who I consider the giants of the style)
eventually released albums that branched out
in strange new ways.
But, well, slowcore is back baby! Get ready
to shuffle along to meandering tunes, moving
at your own pace. Yeah! One instance that
points to the Slowcore Revival is the
reappearance and continuing success of Duster,
who came back and seem to have a nice
following.
But that is an older band reappearing. The
Clearwater Singers, on the other hand, are a
new band making slowcore. This four-piece New
York band make lethargic pop, light and slow,
with a bare hint of twang to the guitars. This
music is surprisingly engaging with the vocals
just on the edge of consciousness, blurred by
slowly chiming guitars.
I love this kind of hazy music, music that
just sort of hangs out, in no real hurry to do
anything. I have found this record to be very
engaging.
The record kicks off with Valley,
which starts off with a hum of guitar
feedback, a bit of misdirection to let you
think this might be some noisy band. But no,
the band kicks in with tapped drums, slow
echoing guitar, and hushed voice, singing
about "a ghost down by the stream". This is
not noise rock – it is quiet, calm, building
to a slow grind with a nice guitar solo. The
band let's this grow for five and a half
minutes, the longest they stretch out on the
record. But it's nice. The longer form works
here.
On River the guitars shine chiming in
layers like the early work of Red House
Painters. the guitars are almost chiming here,
in layers. A lovely tune.
The next song really shines. It's called Let
Us Be Strangers, and it features a
swinging piano riff that reminds me of the
song It’s a Crime I Never Told You About
the Diamonds In Your Eyes by The Black
Heart Procession from back in 1999. The
piano, the shuffling drums, the chiming
guitar, and the wistfulness in the voice all
combine to make this a stunner.
Proud is a happier song, positively
sunny. The guitars jangle with a hint of R.E.M., the
drummer plays a little more forcefully, and
the bass steps forward with a nice rolling
riff. This has a nice jangling chiming guitar,
and the drummer plays a little more forcefully
than usual.
They are back to being somber in Man of
God. Vocalist Sumner Bright voice drips
with melancholy learning as he sings, "Please,
nothing change" to end the song. There is also
a horn that wanders through this song, which
is a nice accompaniment.
Firewood gets almost busy, the drummer
going a bit crazy here. And the band really
hammering at in on the choruses. This reminds
me of The Rave-Ups and The Del Fuegos, bands
that were part of the Roots Rock movement in
the 1980s. There is a similar sort of feel
here.
Heaven's A Bar opens up in the middle
with a droning slide guitar, adding a little
depth to the song. An acoustic guitar joins in
on Weathervane. They pair it with a
nice floor tom heavy drumming. This really
works.
The Clearwater Singers get noisy again on Kites,
which builds to a feedbacky (slow) frenzy. And
then finally the album ends with Radiant
which is a sort of demo, echoey and poorly
recorded, but it shows the prettiness of
Sumner Bright's voice against the delicate
guitar and some birds chirping near wherever
he recorded this demo.
One thing to note is that Bright's voice is
kind of high-pitched. It's not quite a
falsetto, and perhaps not as high pitched as Superchunk's
Mac
McCaughan, but it is kind of different.
Alos, often he is almost speaking. None of
these are serious deterrents, but I know that
some people might find the voice too high, so
if you are sensitive to that sort of thing, be
forewarned.
Now, that said, I think there is a lot to
enjoy here. I like that the songs meander,
taking their time and the band is content to
let them do that, not feeling the need to move
rapidly nor to crowd the songs with excessive
instrumentation. These songs feel spacious,
open, something I associate with slowcore in
general, and I think that The Clearwater
Swimmers are a nice addition to that genre.
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