Welsh Rabbit, Don Quixote vs. Sancho Panza (SEI Records)

[November 21st, 2007]

[UNDECIDED] You know those after-school specials that try to discourage kids from smoking weed? They usually depict a bunch of degenerates getting wasted in a party van (the kind with interior running lights and curtains), listening to the Doors and, later, being involved in some sort of tragic accident. Welsh Rabbit’s debut full-length, Don Quixote vs. Sancho Panza, feels an awful lot like that.

It’s fun in a retro-psychedelic way, and certainly well-meaning, but some of the dialogue’s so bad it makes you downright uncomfortable. Take “Back to Britain,” on which frontman Nick Levine sings, “Infinite spaces/ Louder than time/ Infiltrating my mind.... But they’re just flashes of my purgatory dream,” as if completing a contrived exercise in hallucinatory mind-blowing. Other songs range from reggae-punk à la the Clash (“My Green Belt,” which includes such brilliant insights as “I hate this shit/ And I hate your song/ And I hate your band”) to unpoetic protest songs (“State of the Union”) and stereotypical hard-luck stories (“Baby Doll”).

But even those poorly scripted specials have redeeming qualities. And like that tearjerking funeral scene, Don Quixote ’s melancholy closer, “Backwards from Ten,” sheds new light on the entire effort. Levine offers personal, honest words—“I’ve been messed up for so long”—not to mention a rad, melodic guitar lead. The song then builds and breaks into an explosion of chiming guitar, Kyle Chilla’s insistent bass and Jordan Selman’s crash-’n’-ride drums, over which Levine admits, “Forgot my name/ Until you gave me a name again.”

Much like the broodingly epic post-rock of early-’90s slowcore outfits Hum or Seam, Welsh Rabbit suddenly makes you feel something. And when Levine adds, “And if you wanted/ I’d count backwards from 10,” you don’t know the specifics, but you know it’s about longing—and it’s totally affecting. Likewise, when Chilla (who shares vocal and songwriting duties) adds a soft, wounded, “So fuck you” after the painfully typical, “You broke my heart in two/ When you said, ‘I do,’” on “Dexy’s Midnight Lover,” it feels human. It feels like slinking away from an ex’s wedding with your head down—and it’s far more satisfying than the bombast of the album’s psych-rock efforts. Welsh Rabbit’s own one-sheet claims it offers “truly something for every taste.” After hearing the local trio find its niche on those last few songs, I sure wish it wouldn’t.