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The Last Waltz Done Live At Club Deville
Review: The Cherry Orchard at The Blue Theater
EAST Interview: Beth Hempton of The WonderCraft
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Report Card: A freaking +
The pressure’s been building behind Dave Longstreth’s meandering Dirty Projectors project for the last few years, and 2007’s excellent if somewhat mystifying Black Flag covers/“reimaginations” album Rise Above brought listener intrigue to a new high—could it be that idiosyncratic oddball and former Yale student Longstreth was growing nearer to accessibility? It seems so, and, really, the career trajectory here is not at all unlike that of fellow 2009 darlings Animal Collective, in that both started out hyper-obscure and intentionally abrasive, with an emphasis on willful experimentation and defiance of gratification, only to slowly but surely move towards a refined confidence in heightened normalcy. And that’s not to suggest that either outfit has shirked their uniqueness; they instead have learned to channel their innovation in a way that produces complete songs that human beings will actually enjoy, rather than just fragmentary attacks on musical reason. For Dirty Projectors, that turning point is embodied in the sparkling Bitte Orca.
To be completely and unabashedly straightforward, Bitte Orca is one of the most dynamic and fascinating albums to come out in a long time. Sometimes it feels like a rock album ripped straight from 1974, and other times it’s an elegant string-supported beauty, other times it’s a pop album practically ready for the sweetness of radio, and still even other times it’s an oblique dash through counterintuitive song structures and harmonization. And it’s often all of those things at once. While the instrumentation, led by Longstreth’s singular guitar work, is flawless and captivating in its execution, the big draw that makes the Dirty Projectors stand out is the astounding vocal interplay between Amber Coffman and Angel Deradoorian, who, pictured on the cover of the album, tangle their voices in shocking ways whose artfulness rewards more greatly with each successive listen.
And that’s one of the many signs of excellence illuminating Bitte Orca: that even though the first listen may be a bit “weird” for most people, upon continued listens the pop elements woven beneath even the album’s most seemingly random moments come to the surface—in both tone-setting and bar-raising opener “Cannibal Resource” and the fantastically complicated rock dynamo “Useful Chamber,” there are eyebrow-raising decisions made that at first blush seem purposefully asinine, yet eventually serve as defining examples of the benefits of outside-the-box thinking. To name standouts on this album seems an exercise in futility, as it’s stacked thick with them, but in addition to the two aforementioned tracks, the painfully addictive “Temecula Sunrise” is a candidate for getting stuck in your head so badly it’ll keep you up at night, and no mention of Bitte Orca would be complete without citing the song that’s likely to get the most widespread attention, “Stillness Is the Move.” That song showcases what the band can do when it aims to create a pop masterpiece, and while Longstreth keeps it simple and drummer Brian Mcomber sets a spritely rhythm, Coffman and Deradoorian weave a catchy love anthem worthy of any college iPod.
Ultimately, it’s yet to be seen how this album will stack up against early favorites Animal Collective and Grizzly Bear on the year-end lists, but it’s certainly the most straightforward of the three—there’s not a lot of subtlety going on here, and the directness, not to mention the technical precision pouring out of every song, is more than appreciated. Simply said, you won’t stop realizing that music is being played. Put all of that together and what you get is an album you should get.
Listen to pre-Bitte Orca Dirty Projectors here.
For more hot off the press album reviews, including Animal Collective, Deerhunter, TV on the Radio, M. Ward, and many more, stop by Austin's own Transmission Entertainment.
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Dave graduated from Yale...might want to correct that...