Vocalist/keyboardist/mad pop scientist Spencer Krug made the jump from California (Absolutely Kosher) to the Midwest (Indiana-based Jagjaguwar) for 2007's Random Spirit Lover, a cacophonous slab of 12 tracks that bleed into each other like a dismembered, dystopian version of the Flaming Lips' Soft Bulletin. The occasional Frog Eyes and full-time Wolf Parade member's third foray into the solo world feels a lot less like a foray and more like a firm commitment. Like Frog Eyes, Krug weaves fractured, complex, cacophonous pop songs glued together by a distinct love for melody, but where Frog Eyes wants to violate every part of your body, Sunset Rubdown wants you to stick around and watch the carnage, not be a part of it. Random Spirit Lover bristles with the same manic energy and odd beauty that made 2006's Shut Up I Am Dreaming so rich. Part lo-fi bedroom project and part hi-fi tribute to the excesses of '70s art rock, standout rockers like "Mending of the Gown," "Up on Your Leopard, Upon the End of Your Feral Days," and "Taming of the Hands That Came Back to Life" never stick around long enough to grow tiresome, as Krug keeps things economical. Fans of "Blackberry Way"-era Move, Berlin-era Bowie, late-period Of Montreal, and the Danielson Famile will eat this up like the candy it is.
Wit in music. Not in lyrics, which is easy enough - but in the way one chord leads to another, or a melody appears, or pauses are used. It's a rare phenomenon: one found in the work of classical composers such as Handel and Haydn, say. A (rather more modern) witty album, in my opinion, is Weezer's _Pinkerton_ (leagues better than anything else by the band) - and Sunset Rubdown's _Random Spirit ...
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Is easily the best album I've heard all year...easily. It's packed full of long, mesmerizing, chill enducing, and beautiful Spencer Krug creations. Maybe I'll get tired of it after obsessing about it, but god damn is this album epic! Sorry Feist, sorry LCD Soundsystem, you've got some stiff competition!Sunset Rubdown-Random Spirit Lover: full album review sometime before next friday, promise. M...
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Wit in music. Not in lyrics, which is easy enough - but in the way one chord leads to another, or a melody appears, or pauses are used. It's a rare phenomenon: one found in the work of classical composers such as Handel and Haydn, say. A (rather more modern) witty album, in my opinion, is Weezer's _Pinkerton_ (leagues better than anything else by the band) - and Sunset Rubdown's _Random Spirit ...
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I haven't been able to listen to anything except Random Spirit Lover these past few days. The music is less accessible than that of Wolf Parade, more unattainable and open to interpretation, and I think that allure is part of the reason I've grown so attached. The songs are stories. Shut Up I Am Dreaming spun tales of horses, snakes, dreams, kids who need rides... Random Spirit Lover is a bit d...
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Here is a track from the upcoming Sunset Rubdown record "Random Spirit Lover"
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 "Random Spirit Lover")
