Tokyo Police Club’s debut full-length, Elephant Shell, sits in that purgatory between full of potential and full of crap. I call this zone a purgatory because it is quite possibly the most difficult place to be as a new artist. Unlike being written off as simply shitty, it’s a station that’s sure to garner mixed reviews and bombastic claims in either direction. Unlike being adored, no comparable ego massage comes from being OK. What are you left to do? Twiddle your thumbs?
Let me follow this rather bitchy opening with a disclaimer: Elephant Shell is not a bad album. Their sound is mobile, energetic—guitars bounce eagerly, like superballs, jostling around with speedy drum lines, occasional shouts, bright keyboards. When they’re on, such as in the ambitious “Sixties Remake” or racing “Graves,” the music is positively itching with eager fun, but the jubilation all too often comes off as hollow, put on, make-believe. Lead singer Dave Monks has a voice that squawks more than sings, adding a “quirkiness” to the music that is more aptly described as mildly irritating. The songs, so often orbiting around the same poppy post-punk territory, blur into one another uncomfortably. And here, my friends, is the album’s major flaw: that more than anything, it’s insecure and immature, the musical equivalent of puberty. This is not simply, or even primarily, because the band members themselves are so young. It is largely because they fail to convince the listener that they know who they are–that this identity they’ve tried on now is anything but the flavor of the month, one that will be traded as soon as it proves out of style or, worse, until they get bored.
Given how much this young band has been through in their already short career–blogosphere darlings, whirlwind multinational tours, getting signed to solid independent–Elephant Shell was destined not to simply exist as music, but instead to premiere as event. It’s expected that with so much scrutiny and pressure and expectation, TPC would be undergoing something akin to an identity crisis. But it makes Elephant Shell sound like a mask. I’m still waiting to hear what they really sound like.
Couldn’t make it out to Austin? No problem, we’ve got your cheat-sheet to the artists everyone will be talking about when they get back home.
(Free MP3 downloads available via SXSW Music.)
Be Your Own Pet, “Bicycle, Bicycle, You Are My Bicycle”
We’ll admit these punky Nashville kids kind of scare us, but that probably just has to do with the conviction with which they sing, “We will come to your town/ Burn your house down/ Turn the sky brown.”
British Sea Power, “Waving Flags”
Epic British guitar rock that sounds a bit like Coldplay, but not in a bad way? Yes, please.
Basia Bulat, “In the Night”
This floppy-hat wearing Arcade Fire associate has got a ukele and she’s not afraid to use it. Especially not with a piano, banjo, flute, jangly acoustic guitar and that endearingly earthy voice.
Cassettes Won’t Listen, “Paper Float”
Don’t worry about the name; it’s not an emo band. It’s just an alias for bedroom producer and Ben Gibbard soundalike Jason Drake, which after listening to this stately jam we quickly realized is much more preferable.
Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong, “Lonely Buoy”
A much-hyped British outfit looking to break apart from the pack with an effortlessly tuneful spin on the current ’80s post-punk revival inflicting its peers.
Jens Lekman, “The Opposite of Hallelujah”
Clearly, there aren’t enough Swedish men singing sad songs over old time music hall symphonies. But this one is as good a place as any to start building a collection.
Lightspeed Champion, “Galaxy of the Lost”
A former member of the unfortunately named noise rock act Test Icicles, Devonte Hayes has successfully reinvented himself as a sensitive but slightly gross singer-songwriter with a serious comb over.
Matt & Kim, “Yea Yeah”
The blogosphere loves this indie electro-rock duo. The rest of the world, however, remains woefully oblivious to its lo-fi charms. It’s up to you to change that.
Peggy Sue and the Pirates, “Television”
“Flat screen, I am addicted to it,” sings this British duo, as it casually updates the Slits’ minimalist dub-punk sound. We know the feeling.
The Virgins, “Rich Girls”
Finally, a band interested in revisiting the Stones vastly underrated disco period. Thank you, The Virgins.