Labels: Mud
Review by: Nadia Almashoor
I had such a hard time writing this review. I sat for an hour staring at the screen, rubbing my temples and stealing sporadic looks at the ceiling. I guess it’s just my fear of saying “this album sucks” by who I used to think of as one of the very greatest bands in the autumn/winter of 99. (keep in mind I reside in koala land) But here goes. After much waiting and much anticipation, I received a call from the store to pick up Very Secretary’s latest. You might’ve read other reviews comparing the sounds of this record to that of Elliot Smith. I could pretend and say, “Hell yeah! It’s sooo Elliot Smith, don’t you think?” But I’ve not heard enough of Elliot Smith to make that comparison. Once upon a time I did have a listen to Mr Smith and I classified him under [Boring]. But Standing In The Shade is far from boring. Yes, it sucks but it’s not boring. Over the last couple of days, these 10 tracks had my mind fluctuating back and forth. The 1st time “Feeling Cheated’ invaded my ear drums, instantaneously I thought The Beatles’ Norwegian Wood. Nothing wrong with The Beatles of course but something’s very wrong with David Johnson’s vocals. It just didn’t match the flowing rythmic accoustics. It’s like they decided to cut and paste certain guitar layers here and there and just added vocals and un-rhyming lyrics. (not that rhyming is important) But it felt like certain tracks were incomplete and with some seeming to go on forever but ending very abruptly just when you start to get the hang of it. I guess I was expecting more clones of Nakargot. (which appeared in the fall 98 sampler / tree records post marked stamps comp. cd etc) Politic, however, has got me hitting the repeat button. And humming along unconsciously. It has a simple yet clever structure differentiating the secretaries from any other “accoustic” band with violins. It’s not that bad an album, really. Just not very emergency. File this together with your Rainer Marias and American Footballs. And oh, Elliot Smith of course.