Interesting... This male/female duo hails from Gainesville Florida and plays fairly somber, laidback songs based around lush clean guitars, a warm rhythm section, and flowing female singing. It's not that simple, but that's the basis of it. Distorted guitars are used, but the distortion is always kept at a low level, and often appears to add sustain to textural guitars rather than supplying any core chords (see "Bleak House"). According to the band they've been tagged as "shoegazer" and "sadcore" in the past, but I wouldn't use either of those terms in regards to this at all. I could see it argued that there are elements reminiscent of certain "shoegazer" acts in these compositions, but "sadcore" is not only an insultingly moronic term (whoever said that about the band should be viciously maimed), but it's highly inaccurate. Yes, this is "sad" music in a sense, but it's more complicated than the word would suggest, and there's absolutely no "-core" tied to this music in any way whatsoever. In all truth, there are a lot of atmospheric qualities here... a certain ethereal nature to the way things snake along. It's quite nice, namely in the beautiful "Skinny". They keep things interesting with just the right amount of droning repetition and flowing changes, the performances are generally fluid, and so on. I think the singing comes off as restrained at times, but she does have a great voice. I think finding a more openly comfortable delivery would help, as would playing with some of the harmonizing to make it a bit more prominent and whatnot. I think the recording is quite nice, especially taking into consideration the fact that two people are responsible for all of the vocals and instrumentation (electric/acoustic guitars, bass, drums, keyboards, programming). The guitars sounds pretty damn good, the bass tone is nice and thick, and the drums are also natural and consistent. The vocals are a little dry and plain at times, and the mix needs some tweaking, but they're on the right track. When the vocals are panned they thin out a lot, and in general there's too much separation between some of the layers. It doesn't come off a weak or tinny, but I think everything needs to be reigned in together a little more. The CD-R comes in a slim jewel case with a xeroxed insert that looks pretty decent. It's minimal, but clean and concise, so for a demo it works out. I'd like to give this a higher rating, but as a whole they're just not there yet. There are a few individual tracks that are pointing towards greatness, so I damn sure hope these two can start to garner more attention... as the right label could really work with this band to achieve some wondrous material. I'll be watching...
[self-released]
Running time - 22:19, Tracks: 5
[Notable tracks: Bleak House, Skinny]
The Gale - http://www.thegale.com
