There are a number of things that strike me about TPC. Fortunately there is enough space to detail them all here. The first thing is that I had forgotten about them until this CD. It seems so much has happening in US indie right now. Arcade Fire tapped a rich vein and ever since a slew of bands concerned more with emoting rather than merely posing have emerged. The PR blurb informs me it’s only been 18 months since their debut EP. It feels longer than that. Whether it’s down to an ever-expanding repertoire of quality form the US shores or that TPC were being talked about before any release, is a matter for debate. Not much debate mind, the only question going through my head is, did I like them?
Do I like them? It’s not what I was expecting, and this is my second thought. The songs, each and every one, confound my expectations. The TPC I recall was a slightly weedy one, not in a necessarily bad way. Just a band built for speed rather than power. A band that you could conceivably expand upon as being an extension of the new wave/art school sound. An anorexic The Strokes.
But things have changed.
This is a band building from the bottom up, the bass upwards, quite literally. The drums and guitars no longer skitter and winkle-pick their way in. Instead the drums are pushed to the forefront, especially on ‘Centennial’ and ‘Juno’ they sound echoey and gargantuan. The guitars too moan like oncoming thunder, providing the flash of switchblade on otherwise rapturous melodies.
The third thing that strikes me is how much poise this album has. It all seems recorded on the front foot. Either gasping in quickening rhythms; hidden and awaiting to strike. Or else chasing you you down, an unhinged free runner vaulting objects in an attempt to commit whatever evil is on his mind. And it all leads to the conclusion that for the most part , the hidden adventures of aside, it’s a collection of songs destined to fill dance floors in discotheques and beyond. But again, because it’s indie music, and with the current climate in place, the song begins it all. Now and again the lyrics self regard squeezes a little fallout boy at the disco histrionics into the sunlight, but it is thankfully fleeting.
The bass and drums and guitar drive euphorically forward, but this is no hedonistic entreaties. The vocals mark the counterpoint, that searched for sadness and ennui that will continue to hook you in when you are tired.
And this is the heart of all that is good here. The dual of hand-clap against drum and guitar against the regret pulled through the defeated vocal. It’s an album that cleaves a little more with each listen, a crescendo of destruction seen from a distance that’s on you all too soon.