After everything.

Personalities of its members aside, The Church is my ideal band. In the past 35 or so years, it has matured from jangly post-punk to a mix of psychedelia, ambient and dreampop. To me, the romantic ideal of a two-guitar band is embodied in The Church, as the guitarists refused to adopt the usual lead/rhythm guitarist roles. Both Peter Koppes and Marty Wilson-Piper interwove lead riffs and panned them hard-right and left. (Sadly, Wilson-Piper is no longer a member of the band.)

Last weekend, I fell back into After Everything Now This, my favorite album by The Church. The band had started falling into the usual trap of recording covers and endless jams, and After Everything Now This marked a return to songwriting. While it’s not necessarily the band’s best or most historically important record, it was the first album by The Church that I bought on its release day. The riffs (especially on this almost-title cut) bring back that warm feeling of basking in the summer sun in my Ford Aspire and impatiently waiting for the air conditioning to finally get cool.

Guess I could say more, but why don’t you just listen to the song for yourself?

 

 

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Driving. Rotation. Pacifico. Freddie Mercury.

I started my job as a Pizza Hut delivery driver on Sunday. (I cooked and delivered pizzas through college, so there was no learning curve. It’s okay, while I look for a real job.) The hours are horrible if you enjoy a happy marriage, but I have had some joy in driving around and listening to music. I just don’t think enough people really listen to music in their cars these days. Everyone’s distracted by their cell phones, or they just listen to the crappy radio with commercials screaming at you, breaking up what few songs are played. Anyway, my rotation this week, in no particular order…

1. Joy Electric – Ministry of Archers (2005)
2. Starflyer 59 – Dial M (2008)
3. St. Vincent – Actor (2009)
4. Joy Electric – Curiosities and Such (2009)
5. Marty Wilson-Piper – Nightjar (2008)
6. Pet Shop Boys – Alternative, disc 2 (1995)
7. TV On the Radio – Dear Science (2008)
8. Pacifico – Thin Skin and an Open Heart (2009)
9. Martin L. Gore – Counterfeit EP (1989)
10. R.E.M. – Murmur (1983)

I really dig the new Pacifico album. Matthew Schwartz sounds like he’s singing for girls but also not singing for girls. Sure, most of his songs could appeal to the self-enlightened teenage girl who thinks that the Juno soundtrack rivals Abbey Road, but there are many more points of reference in his music than trendy, chick-friendly schmaltz. He’s a really good singer, channeling a lot of Brian Wilson at times, with a cavalcade of background vocals. I also hear touches of The Posies, Starflyer 59, and maybe the Go-Betweens(?).

On a complely unrelated note, my brother-in-law was on a Queen kick yesterday. Now I can’t get “Save Me” out of my head.