I had to get this release. Just go to the Caulfield website (link at the bottom in case you don’t know it by heart) and go into the jukebox section and listen to the song “Happy Birthday”. That’s what I’ve done a few times in the past couple of weeks. Once you’ve heard it, you’ll want to buy this too.
LOA have the guy who is in charge of the ‘field singing, and cool – it’s not often you get people who can do 1 job great, let alone 2 or 3. And Bernie not only runs a great record label, but his spot on, noisily sung vocals are a perfect fit for the jumpy indie rock that is present on most of the 6 songs here.
“Happy Birthday” sounds even better on record than on scratchy real audio. Just listen as the Promise Ring-esque chorus on this one flow out the speakers, and get the lyrics “Of all my bad ideas, this one takes your cake, and throws it in the street”. Neato. Melodic and poppy, with touches of Braid and some other bands, I’ve seen Superchunk mentioned – I don’t have much for reference but wouldn’t say that’s off the mark. They have a similar idea to both bands on what pop should be. And it just so happens to measure up with my thoughts too.
Most of the songs tend to bounce you a long, blurring the jangly guitars into the more crunchy bits to create a super cool sound, and drive things a long when it gets a bit faster. They do have a couple of slowies too, but they don’t spoil things.
Worth picking up totally, be interesting to see if a future full length can develop the band even more.