I was first introduced to the mp3 blogging world about a year and a half ago, and soon after discovered the music of a little known group of teachers in Chicago called Track A Tiger. For me their 2006 debut album, Woke Up Early The Day I Died, will be forever linked to this time because it was the first CD I ever bought strictly on advice/mp3 samples from blogs. And you always remember your first, right? I still remember time and place of my first Bruce song, my first Replacements song, first Spoon song, etc…(MTV, “Born In The USA” video, 10 years old/“Waitress In The Sky”, friend’s car, 16/“Take the Fifth”, Uncut Mag Promo CD, 26). And to top it all off, Woke Up Early… was (and is) really good.
So, skip ahead a while and here I am in the luxurious Pop Headwound headquarters with a promo copy of that very same band’s sophomore album, We Moved Like Ghosts. It was released this week on Deep Elm Records, and will see a much wider distribution than the debut. We Moved Like Ghosts still features everything I loved about the band the first time around - the gorgeous male-female harmonies, the spacious arrangements, the expert meshing of acoustic/electric guitars and echoey keyboards, but this time sounds worlds more self-assured. Songs like “All These Accidents” and “Don’t Make A Weapon” perfect the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot-inspired laptop folk of the debut, while “Summer’s End” and “Light” find the band playing around with some new ideas and song structures (especially with the prominence of the normally harmonizing Kristina Castaneda). Plus there is a dramatic reworking of Woke Up Early’s… closing track, “With Stars Down”. Here it is completely re-imagined, given a strong beat and shimmering, intertwining guitars and keys. All in all, We Moved Like Ghosts is a beautiful and hypnotic progressive-folk record, and should bring even wider acclaim to a band that certainly deserves it.
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MP3 :: Don't Make A Weapon
MP3 :: All These Accidents
(from We Moved Like Ghosts)
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MP3 :: All These Accidents
(from We Moved Like Ghosts)
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Purchase We Moved Like Ghosts HERE
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3 comments:
I remember the first time I heard this band too - in the car driving alongside my best friend. Thanks for continuing to recommend great stuff...
The link for Don't Make A Weapon doesnt seem to work. I think it's b/c you put an apostrophe in the filename, and fileden didnt like that.
Thanks!
Hey - Thanks for the heads up!! I can't stand that about Fileden - that they have a hard time with apostrophes.
It should be fine now!
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