CD Reviews: Misc. and Chores

[April 1st, 2009]

Misc. Happiness is Easy

(Badman)

Judging by the acts on his Badman label, one would assume Dylan Magierek to be a renaissance man. He has signed folk-rock, electro-pop and whatever the hell you call My Morning Jacket to the Portland label. And Happiness is Easy, the latest release from Magierek’s own musical venture, Misc., confirms Magierek’s broad musical taste.

As the project’s name would imply, there’s a mixtape quality to the tracks on Happiness is Easy. It’s something the listener notices just a few minutes into the record. The disc’s opening tune, “Temporary Residence,” is a closing-credits atmospheric instrumental fueled by a repeated burst of delay pedal guitar feedback hauntingly reminiscent of the memorable riff from Elastica’s “Connection.” The next song, “In a Studio of Keepsakes,” takes a left turn: It’s a haunting, bassy waltz driven by Tim Mooney’s drum fills and the free-poetry verses of pure-throated L.A. singer-songwriter Daniel Ahearn, who appears on half of the album’s 10 songs.

The problem with mixtape-style albums isn’t their diversity, it’s their delivery: Rilo Kiley should have never attempted disco-pop; U2 should have never gone Motown. But if Magierek and company can mix a twee piano/banjo piece called (of all the twee song titles in the universe, this is the most twee) “Wes Anderson” and a Sneaker Pimps-style sexy electro-pop cut (“Korea vs. Japan”) without skipping a beat, more power to them. Happiness is Easy proves that it can be done, and done well.

One could argue that the five songs with Ahearn on vocal duties would be better suited as a more cohesive, early-emo-inspired EP of their own, but it’s the other half of the album that keeps the formula from growing tired and makes Happiness is Easy such a pleasant surprise.

Chores The Subtle Politics of the Public Hammock

(Field Hymns) There has probably never been a better time in our nation’s history to release a politically populist pop album. So it’s refreshing to hear Chores’ dual frontpeople, Jada Pierce and Lou Thomas, sing: “We can’t make it when we try/ That invisible hand always lies/ We need more than just a handout/ A new new deal.” Were these lyrics penned just after the ugly AIG bonuses scandal? Is the Portland quartet positioning itself to be the official band of the angry mob?

Surprisingly, that’s a no on both counts. Chores’ awkwardly titled new album, The Subtle Politics of the Public Hammock, was written before this latest batch of Wall Street outrages and generally embraces a passive criticism of the new American order rather than what our prez might call “the politics of destruction.” The lyrical anger of “Make the World Go Away” stops short of asking fans for a grassroots revolution, as does the grinding and spelled-out pop-punk anthem “Noninsuranceland.”

Obviously, Chores shouldn’t be responsible for solving America’s problems in song. And whatever questions are left unanswered in the band’s lyrics are generally overshadowed by a smart, Pavement-meets-Sleater-Kinney delivery and sly pop hooks. Production help from local luminaries Mike Coykendall and Gus Elg, as well as guest spots from Alan Singley, saxophonist Reed Wallsmith and David “Paper/Upper/Cuts” Fimbres, all help The Subtle Politics... to sound fantastic. “New New Deal,” a critique of trickle-down economics nestled between warm Rhodes-style piano hooks and needling guitar, is the record’s shining moment. The addition of Wallsmith’s saxophone lines toward the end of the track give it a cinematic feel, like Morphine meeting Fugazi in a back alley and trading literature.

Still, when songs like “Super Car” and “Rose” feature some of the album’s most innocuous lyrics and its rawest, most inspired rocking, it could leave an angry mob sort of “meh,” waiting for the day when Chores gets its music and its message on the same page.