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The Laās made their first and only album three times, and rejected all three for not being good enough. The label got fed up and released the third attempt without frontman Lee Maversā permission. Mavers has dismissed it ever since as being āall fucked up like a snake with a broken back.ā I get that itās his burden to strive for perfection, but his failure is my inspiration.
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I relistened to this album a while back and have been stuck on it for months. There is not a single wrong note, not a single moment of hesitation on the whole record. It is pop rock written and performed with a despotic level of focus. As far as songwriters go, Lee Mavers may well be the equivalent of a mad scientist deep underground trying to create a perfect vacuum night after night. The songs are concentrated, some of them so economically structured that they barely even exist. They may not be ambitious in scope or message, but they are crystal clear statements.Ā
I love Lee Maversā voice more than anything, he sings like he wishes his voice could be as perfect as a guitar. Heās straining so hard, he hits each note so squarely on its head, never a syllable out of time, heās got no room for attitude, heās trying to write songsā¦
Feb 6, 2025
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My friend Matthew Caws went about his music career completely backward.
His band, Nada Surf, had an MTV hit very early in their career, "Popular," and were then dropped (let go, get it?) by the major label that signed them and proceeded to make the best album of their careers on an indie label, without pressure or deadline.
As he told me once: "It's as if we got to start over again, a new band."
Matthew was living a musical life; working in a Brooklyn record store called Earwax, going to shows, writing music. In a way, "Let Go" is a record that asks "what if you had a second chance to do it all over again, the way YOU wanted to do it all along?" And then diving from head to toe into that opportunity.
I've had "Let Go" kicking around in one format or another for more than twenty years and always find something new to love about it; isn't that the very definition of "Favoritte album?"
"Blizzard of '77:" A mellow little piece of recoverred (drug) memory with a decidedly Elliott Smith vibe to it. Produced by then-Death Cab for Cutie member Chris Walla for $100, which the band paid to him in $1 and $5 bills from their merch sales at shows.
"Treading Water:" Linked here, the sound of what adulting in Manhattan looked like then (and still does). "Always rushing, always late."
"Neither Heaven Nor Space:" just high. "And if you sit long enough, you can hear ghost trains/As if the city speed is just in our brains/And coke's as close as we get to sugar cane."
"Blonde on Blonde:" Living that below-14th Street life, soundtracked by Dylan.
"Paper Boats:" a floaty, dreamy ode to depression. "Been thinking and drinking, all over the town/Must be gearing up for some kind of meltdown."
Years later, Matthew and I met up while they were recording their album "Lucky" at a live-in studio in Seattle called Robert Lang (it's the same place where Dave Grohl recorded the first Foo Fighters album). He had just discovered he was a dad and was in the middle of a custody fight over the child -- the mother hadn't told him it was his, there were lots of complications -- and we were comparing notes on fatherhood and just generally in the same headspace about having plenty of problems but being fortunate to have them. He's one of my favorite humans and "Let Go" is his masterpiece.
Oct 2, 2024
Rarely am I so captivated with such an odd album. Here's my review:
Like some Star Wars fans think you should watch the movies out of order for the best storytelling of the overarching canon, I have a proposal for you before you dig into this baddie.
Start at the title track "Supermarket Woman", Track 9. One condition to proceed past this song is that you have to like it. If you don't like Track 9, then just don't bother with the rest of the album and save yourself an hour.
Now for the rest of you that are onboard, go from Track 9.
Best put by a friend, "it sounds like they told ai to make an album that sounds like 1950s commercialism and island music had a baby". I'd go to add that this supposed AI was a fan of Wesley Willis, too.
From this dystopian lo-fi bop (bop used sparingly in my dictionary) to the top of the album is like the whiplash from a double-shot of whiskey directly into snorting a line of blow...if whiskey was a liminal space fever-dream and the cocaine were the Balearic Islands.
You might also find yourself in the downtempo post-post-punk boogie woogie you dreamt of DJing for your one (1) friend that would tolerate it and the four (4) other bystanders hanging out at the record shop at 2pm on a Friday.
After a Spanish influence brings us into the first two songs of the album, we pivot into a dance track at Track 3, "9 Moons" (a remix release was put out as well), and onward through a gentle, rhythmic and interesting ride down to the "Lambrusco Party" (Track 5).
My energy keeping consistent, yet meditative, "Six Am" (Track 6) is exactly how I want to wake up after a molly bender on a pale-sand beach. It would motivate anyone for a mushroom-spinach omelette after a night like that.
I sank into Tracks 7 & 8, understanding the definition of an album-cut here, desperately edging on the story arc of how-in-the-fuck we get back to Track 9 through this album's story. I need a snack.
Like a cold-handed caress after a slap to the face, Track 10 & 11 wind me back down.
"In a State" (Track 12); Thom Yorke as fuck. What can't Lemonade Market do?
The proverbial needle hits the proverbial run-out groove on this record and it has me longing with questions in the music's absence. Questions about who these three white figures on the album cover are, where the chairs in which they're sitting were photographed, and why on god's green earth they used that font along the bottom.
Album Rating: 10/10
Feb 14, 2024
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my friend Kevin sent me this album last night and it's really scratching the itch I had for like, straightforward classic indie rock but done very well. the songs are so direct and deliberate and I love how stripped down the arrangements are. kinda feels like yo la tengo at their best, some of the motifs songs etc. I <3 music
Jan 4, 2024
Top Recs from @cameron-winter
For a brief period in the late 60s and early 1970s Miles Davisā spiralling drug use and creative genius hit simultaneous peaks (a period which ended abruptly in October of 1972 when he obliterated a sports car full of coke, and every bone in both his legs, against a traffic column. The drug use would go on to make a full recovery, his genius would not). In these years Miles would frequently walk into Columbia Studio B and, seemingly with ten ounces of the good stuff dissolving in his rectum, offhandedly churn out total brilliance, music full of darkness and rhythm, at the cutting edge of several genres. I know itās often said that even geniuses need to write several bad songs for every good one, but I swear to God itās like even the scraps of tape they left on the floor during these sessions are solid gold. Itās possible Miles arranged some kind of deal with the devil to get an advance payment of good songs and pay off the bad ones in the 80s.Ā
Feb 6, 2025
In 2022 during my bandās first tour ever I witnessed the honest-to-God USAā¢ for the first time, and after about 2799 miles of driving I was about to chalk the whole country up to a disappointment until, not unlike the murderous fur-trappers of the early 19th century, I was rewarded for my long slog through the Bleak American NothingnessĀ® with something approximating paradise. Spending a sunny day in Big Sur can make your whole week.
Feb 6, 2025
Chorus is catchy as sin. They knew the verse parts sucked so they made them as short as possible. Where the hell did he come from / go?
Feb 6, 2025