New Ruins
Alessiana
Posts: 329
Ok... I'd posted about this band in another forum but it's down. Anyway, I can't stop playing their album.
http://www.myspace.com/newruins
The few songs on this page don't display how good the CD is. You can get it from their label (link on myspace) or on http://www.emusic.com.
Fucking addictive if you like indie
http://www.myspace.com/newruins
The few songs on this page don't display how good the CD is. You can get it from their label (link on myspace) or on http://www.emusic.com.
Fucking addictive if you like indie
****
Aless
Tell them you love them. Never let the mundane, the unimportant, or worse, the misunderstood, be the final words of parting.
Tell them.
Aless
Tell them you love them. Never let the mundane, the unimportant, or worse, the misunderstood, be the final words of parting.
Tell them.
Post edited by Unknown User on
0
Comments
here's a review
Review by J. Edward Keyes
It could be argued that the best songs are born of troubled relationships — a fact fully supported by the harrowing debut from the Chicago group New Ruins. Witness: chief Ruiners Elzie Sexton and J. Caleb Means have known each other for over a decade now, first crossing paths at age 15 and together weathering punk phases and folk phases and finally coming out the other side weathered and jaded. New Ruins was born while its members were in college — two different colleges, separated by 600 miles (that's where the "troubled" comes in). Sexton and Means exchanged tapes via the mail and met on breaks to write and record and collaborate, knowing that all good relationships require dedication to overcome problem spots.
Fortunately, The Sound They Make was worth the effort it took to create it. In eleven songs of grim, ravaged beauty, New Ruins recall the National and American Music Club and Grant Lee Buffalo without copying any of them outright. Both Sexton and Means have deep, dire baritones, and their songs are invaded by a kind of shadow and sorrow that bleeds into even the up-tempo numbers: "Ships" is propelled by a rocketing tempo and ragged guitars, but the morose vocal keeps repeating "holes in our ships."
"Book Lung" rattles like a bum carburetor, cacophonous percussion and a low, groaning cello guiding the song to its ominous concluding refrain: "Your ghost still walks all around these hills." It's that sentiment that best sums up The Sound They Make: snapshots of spirits floating through places in time, half-remembered memories of people loved and forgotten. The record feels like a scrapbook, its minor-key strumming and lowing strings as brittle and yellowed as aging oak pages. And that's where that foundational relationship becomes an asset: Sexton and Means disappear into each other, twin voices that help each other sort out the photographs, piece through the details and create new fictions. Their characters occupy the empty space between desperation and resignation. With friends like these, who needs memories?
Aless
Tell them you love them. Never let the mundane, the unimportant, or worse, the misunderstood, be the final words of parting.
Tell them.