This trio of women from Seattle play a fairly original style of twisted, dark rock if you ask me. I have no idea what I'd call it. It tends to be driven by bass and drums, with vocals also playing a larger role than the guitars. A multi vocal approach with singing, screaming, yelling, shouting, speaking, or layered combinations of said deliveries makes things all the more unusual, but the music is pretty quirky as well, rarely breaking into straightforward chord progressions in favor of note based riffs or one set of elements (i.e. guitars or the rhythm section) keeping steady while the other stays looser. Admittedly a few moments on this disc do bring to mind a handful of Seattle bands (that shall remain nameless), but this definitely sounds unique to me. I've read a few reviews that compared Free Verse to Fugazi, but I find that to be highly inaccurate, as nothing here is really along those lines at all. The production is okay, it just needs evening out. The guitars need a better tone, the drums need more low-end, and the vocals need to slide in with the music more. There's a lot of panning, which is awesome in headphones, but it does cause some unnecessary separation in the grand scheme of things. The layout's not so bad. I really like the painting on the cover, and the band photo inside the booklet is hyper colorful, which looks slick, but I'm not into the fonts at all, and the other band photos look slightly forced as far as the poses and shit go. Not a big deal, but it does sort of give off a weird vibe. The lyrics for each track are actually fairly long, touching on several topics, generally fairly personal and pointed towards a pessimistic worldview, but in a creative manner. "Slowly you picked apart my inconsistencies so convincingly that I died at your feet right before my eyes, not a battered woman's endurance or the patience of saints is enough to escape an ordinary life, the net is cast wide, dreams lie lifeless and blue refusing to be revived, these are souls who will survive their own death to live in a sea of boiling water on a diet of stones..." I think the man setback here could be a possible lack of direction. They've got a unique sound, and I think there's promise, but the songs don't necessarily go anywhere, so there aren't that many memorable moments as a result. I'm not saying that it needs to be catchy or what have you, but it needs a little extra something to give it that kick. "Invisible Tomorrow" is a good example of a song that does have the focus that I'm suggesting here... so they're capable of hitting the mark. If this was a 7" with two songs it would be stronger, but I can't get into some of what's going on.
[Demirep/Agitprop!]
Running time - 20:38, Tracks: 6
[Notable tracks: Invisible Tomorrow, Sinking Into the Shadows]
Free Verse - http://www.freeverse.tv
