pAper chAse

MOG
> Blog Posts
>
pAper chAse

Subscribe Now | Learn More

jenny

Add To My Trusted Moggers

pAper chAse

Posted over 3 years ago

Artist:
- PLAY
The Paper Chase
Album:
- PLAY
- QUEUE
Now You Are One of Us

My first package from Splendid (the late "we review everything" website) was pretty awful...but it did contain the pAper chAse's Cntrl-Alt-Del-U, an abrasive, off-kilter, fiercely intelligent piece of noise punk that was, as it turned out, pretty far from the band's best. Now three-four records later, Congleton and crew are back with a really good one called Now You Are One of Us, an anxiety attack of a record, laced with ghostly sounds and uncomfortable medical metaphors, but anchored in prickly, difficult hooks. I interviewed John a few weeks ago for PopMatters and thought he was pretty interesting...the story went up today and here's a link:http://www.popmatters.com/music/interviews/paper-chase-060803.shtml

Comments (2)

Add To My Trusted Moggers

max says i must ask...what is this "splendid" do they send you like packages of cd's every month or something..eh? enlighten me please

Permalink posted 08/03/2006
Add To My Trusted Moggers

jenny says It's all done now, but Splendid was a Chicago-based music website that started about the same time as Pitchfork. George Zahora was the editor, and it was his idea that the site should review every damn record that came in, and so we did, for about ten years. Finally, there were just too many records, most of them terrible, so with much misgivings, the site closed at the end of 2005. George gave me a start in music writing when no one else would, and I heard more great, totally-under-the-radar music through Splendid that any other vehicle before or since. But, yes, to answer your question, he sent out packages of 15-18 records every month with the understanding that all of us would do three reviews a week, one long, two short. The first couple of packages were usually stuff that no one else wanted and so fairly low quality. They got better as you proved yourself reliable and as George figured out what your strengths and blind spots were. The site's still up, if you're interested...www.splendidmagazine.com There's nothing new going up, but it automatically refreshes with different reviews every time you look at it.

Permalink posted 08/03/2006