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This is the second album from this fun Irish
band, but, let's jsut cut to the chase and
address the most importan issue first. How the
heck do you pronounce that name? So i Googled
that and I found this:
The band name is in Irish and comes
from 15th century Pirate Queen, Grinne Mhaol.
The brackets in the name isolate the "h" which
changes the "w" sound of the "mh" to an "m"
sound so the name is pronounced like "male"
because that's funny...
This quote comes from the Orange Amps website,
where they interviewed lead band member
Constance Keane. The band does not bother to
explain this on their BandCamp, and their
label does not bother to explain it
either. Ultimately, being named after a pirate
queen is kind of cool. But Ireland, come on
guys -- what the hell is up with the way you
spell things?
Anyway, this is their second album, and in
listening to their work I have been struck by
their complex and fascinating rhythms. The
reason this band seems so rhythmic is that
leader and principle songwriter Constance
Keane is the drummer and that the band has two
bassists: Jamie Hyland and Zo Greenway. And
boy do these ladies know a beat!
These songs surge forward under these
rhythms, and if anything I think the band has
gotten even better in the two years since
their debut. This album is dominated by rhythm
in a way that few records are. If my hips
still worked enough to allow dancing, I would
be all over the floor to these tunes. As it
is, the best I can do is blast in my
headphones as I ride the exercise bike.
M(h)aol make great songs for moving, however
you can move.
Speaking of moving rhythms, I want to talk
about one of the songs on this record, one
that I think is fan-freaking-tastic and, the
first time I heard it, made me stop dead in my
tracks to just listen. It's called 1-800-Call-Me-Back
and it uses number dial sounds as a type of
rhythm in the song. What a brilliant idea and
why has no one else thought to do this? Or did
someone else do it first and it was just an
obscure thing that I am not aware of? Anyway,
the song is catchy as all hell, with someone
typing away on their phone while Keane sings
and beats a jaunty rhythm on her drums as the
guitar and bass make noise. What a fun tune!
That's the song that standouts the most to
me, put there is a lot to like here.
There are two songs that parallel songs on
their debut record. And what I mean by that is
that one the debut you had the fun Kim is
a Punk Type Dog, a love song from Keane
to her beloved pooch. And on this record we
get I Miss My Dog, which is about Kim
the punk dog being missed after she crossed
The Rainbow Bridge. I'm not a dog person, but
13 years with an animal is a good long time.
And both tunes are fun.
The next parallel is more disturbing than the
sorrow of hearing about her dead dog.
M(h)aol's debut started with the bitter Asking
For It and this record starts with Pursuit,
which is about Keane trying to avoid a
situation where someone would say she was
"asking for it". This is all disturbing,
really, but both are great tunes, and I think
that Keane is trying to interpret her negative
experiences by screaming about them. On Pursuit
her insistent drum beat is joined by Sean
Nolan's overdriven guitar, as the song grows,
becoming faster as she runs faster, more
frantic, at the end Keane is screaming about
trying to escape pursuit... A hell of a song.
One more track of note: on Vin Deisel
the basses and the drums keep a really fun
stop start rhythm as Nolan mutters through
some echo about ... something that I guess has
to do with Vin Diesel. This is an odd song
with really strange rhythms, but it's fun.
And that is what I like about M(h)aol: their
music is fun. It helps that they are doing
different things, and the two bass, guitar,
drums lineup is a little different.
I really like this record. M(h)aol continue
to impress.
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