After releasing three singles on SharkAttack! and providing very little information about themselves, Charlene release their eponymous debut full-length. While the singles were simple, sparse, and often brief, these recordings feature a denser sound, with more instruments and a clear evolution in production.
 
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The peculiarity of Pavement's music to me has always been its indifference. A song like "Loretta's Scars" is at once dreary as well as rousing. Stephen Malkmus's slackeristic vocals contribute to the indifference, but I think it has more to do with the unconventional composition of Pavement's songs. On the one hand, at the time 'Slanted and Enchanted' was recorded, you had a bunch of fellows who, at best, had moderate skill with their instruments, yet a fairly intimate connection with them. On the other hand, part of the band was living outside NYC, while the other part was back in Stockton, California, and so the result is a sort of bicoastal composition which successfully hybridized a bunch of antagonistic pairs: Malkmus's melody craft with Kannberg's explosiveness; menacing snarls with mournful croons; an East Coast melancholy with a west coast optimism.
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When Mineral disbanded following the completion of their second record, 'EndSerending,' many fans of their brand of plaintive and emotional rock were stunned and dismayed. In just a short time, Mineral had not only amassed a loyal following and had been courted by a number of major labels—even signing with Virgin but calling it quits before they could record anything—but they had also nearly changed their sound completely. Once a punk-laced energetic emo band like Sunny Day Real Estate, they were now fans of sprawling melodic structures with even more soaring vocals. Founding members Chris Simpson and Jeremy Gomez decided to continue making music together under the moniker The Gloria Record, and released several EPs and singles on Crank!. With this, their first full-length, the Gloria Record accomplishes the same growth in sound Mineral showed from their first LP to 'Endserenading.'
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Although 'This Night' features a number of solidly written songs, this extremely production-heavy album emphasizes its faux-velvet-bell-bottom-wearin'-chamber-pop sound so forcefully—to the point of being tedious—that even those who acclimate will probably remain disgruntled.
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On 'Kicker in Tow,' Hangedup explore territory stylistically similar to their excellent self-titled debut, but the viola and percussion duo is even more finely tuned and powerfully compelling this time, making this a wonderful album. They play repetitive but lively rock music with clear minimalism and folk influences, and the nine songs on this record are a blend of well-executed improvised and composed pieces.
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Right off the bat I want to get something off my chest: had I not been familiar with Whitman's work as Hrvatski nor trusting of the label Kranky, I would have been completely thrown off by the clinicization of music by the words "laptop," "ring modulators," "granular re-synthesis algorithms," "drone," "academic," and (especially) "Terry Riley" in the description on the web site. Seeing something like this is almost remeniscent of the magic of fucking nearly ruined by the overexplaination by a creepy teacher in a high school sex ed class. That said, the music on KFW's debut is alarmingly attention-commanding for a beat-less, lyric-free excursion.
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