We’ve been pretty clear about how we think reviews-by-comparison are lame — we like to throw around big words like “reductive” and “fucking horseshit” — but our disdain holds especially true when the comparisons are just wrong.

So for the record, Listen, Dammit, hereby definitively states that kc quilty is not some reincarnation of grunge. (That said, one song does sound kind of like Soundgarden; more on that in a sec.)

The Brooklyn trio gets a lot of grunge comparisons, which is perhaps a little understandable: there’s definitely an early ’90s indie-rock aesthetic happening on the group’s full-length debut, “Clover/Coriander” (Cooling Pie Records.) There’s a charming, slightly ramshackle feel to many of the 10 songs, and the band is fond of muscular chugging guitars and big, blakka-blakka drums.

Guitarist Sadie Dupuis sings with off-handed assurance, which comes off as alluring and a little aloof on opener “Clothes” and enigmatic as she sings about beanstalks and starvation on “Jackshit.”

She trades vocals with drummer Julian Fader on “Tags” (one of two songs he mostly wrote), which starts with swift acoustic guitar and erupts into a blast of white noise; and the whole band stretches out on “Supernova” — “a Soundgarden rip-off,” Dupuis writes — which looms dark and menacing in an open tuning on guitar.

“Clover/Coriander” took the band several years to make, and their effort is the your reward: it’s a strong collection from a group that is without question more than the sum of its influences.

LISTEN
Jackshit mp3

February 26, 2010 at 3:36 pm | Share |