Band: The Morning After Girls
Release: 2009

Comments: A shoe-gazey effort that literally does not make you want to stop looking at your shoes. That’s because upon listening your head will consistently (but very very slowly) be moving down and side to side. I wouldn’t say The Morning After Girls are purely psychedelic, but they are quite a spacey group. The first track “The Best Explanation” is a decent defense for my just mentioned claim. Picking things up to a more “alternative” level is “The General Public.” Present is a certain quality of mainstream rock instrumentation (like Dandy Warhols). The title track “Alone” makes you really think of the Dandy Warhols, even if you purposely didn’t want to conjure up a musical image of the group. It’s an inevitable thing. “Death Processions” is like death, but not quite. The vocals are sort of scary, but the guitar and drums scream Drones, which we all know isn’t anything like a…haunted house. The backing vocals are neat. “Part of Your Nature” is acoustically simple, ethereal vocals and all. “You Need To Die” is like a heavy combination of Radiohead’s “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” and No Age’s “Neck Escaper.” But that’s only for like the first 30 seconds. Still very good. “To Be Your Loss” is almost as if the band decided to amplify the opening to “You Need To Die” then add some spazzy drums. I’d consider this one of the album’s best tracks, actually. I like the Veils-y avant-garde minimalism of “There’s a Taking.” It’s just kind of there, for one because the band breaks out with another instant-classic acoustic tune in “Still Falling.” “Who Is They” is win. Very very win. Heard of a 15 minute song? Besides the post-rock half-hour long song craziness of Godspeed You! Black Emperor…15 minute songs are unheard of. And in all fairness to my stupidity, the finale “Tomorrow’s Time” is six minutes of actual music and one minute of noise.

Grade: 9.0 – I’m impressed by this album…which you can listen to in its entirety here: http://www.pastemagazine.com/action/paste_station?station_track=track_10839_1807&mode=normal