If I don't make it, I love u
Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.
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Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.
Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.
Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.
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Available To Order (Estimated Shipping between 7-14 Working Days)
This item is to the best of our knowledge available to us from the supplier and should ship to you within the time-frame indicated. If there are any unforeseen issues with availability we will notify you immediately
Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.
Available To Order (Estimated Shipping between 7-14 Working Days)
This item is to the best of our knowledge available to us from the supplier and should ship to you within the time-frame indicated. If there are any unforeseen issues with availability we will notify you immediately
Genuinely smart art school rock is hard to come by, but Still House Plants make it sound easy, welding subtly R&B-inflected vocals to fractured, free jazz-cum-post rock drums and Shellac-strength axe acrobatics on their incredible third album. Genius, just a bit.
There was a moment during post-rock's evolution when it felt as if the jazz influence that had been simmering in the background since the Talk Talk days was about to bubble over. Tortoise were making firmer connections with Chicago's pantheon of jazz greats, and bands like Boston's Karate were using a music school education to fuel songs that felt kaleidoscopic and open-minded. But as the '90s drew to a close, the genre tightened up and seemed to wander one of two ways: overbearing darkness or luxury car adverts. Still House Plants formed in 2015 at the Glasgow School of Art, and since then have been painstakingly figuring out how to reconcile their web of influences. The backbone is spiky-but-technical US basement rock like Slint or Shellac, but Jessica Hickie-Kallenbach's spine-tinglingly soulful vocals immediately skew the energy, and the band's interest in electronic recording techniques puts them more in line with day zero post-rockers Bark Psychosis.
They lean into all these contradictions on 'If I don't make it, I love u', infusing their spidery rhythms and angular guitars with illusory production techniques that don't upset the mood, letting the powerful vocals swirl around front of house. Much has been made of the trio's love of UKG, and while that's a potentially lazy reference point, Hickie-Kallenbach's delivery is unmistakably indebted to club music. So much so that the fusion is brilliantly unsettling at first; on 'M M M', she loops late night memories ("I just want my friends to get in!") while David Kennedy thuds jerky rhythms and Finlay Clark phases asymmetric strums. Their process is confident and unique, slipping from cohesion into freeform chaos - the vocal hooks remain, but Kennedy and Clark sound as if they're remixing themselves on the fly: the drums splay into fragments, the guitar layered into tremolo'd wails.
It's easy music to like, the kind of gear that's ambitious without being lofty. You can spot the references, in fact Still House Plants don't bother to cover up their influences, instead feeding off their apparent contradictions in a way that's just a joy to try and suss out even after the umpteenth play. They're just a ridiculously tight band, at the peak of their thing, apparently enjoying every minute of it.
A great album, 10/10.