National Coma

I haven't been inspired to post anything in quite a while. I'm not sure why. But today I am, and it's not by anything very vintage, unless you consider an album from 1993 to be vintage (and some of you younger folks might!). So today I'll be writing about an album that doesn't really fit on this blog, because it's been a while since one album excited me this much.

My own band, Awful Lot of Tigers (my wife and myself), doesn't sound very vintage, though we certainly draw inspiration from music of the '60s, '70s and '80s as well as more modern sounds. Last year I was looking for bands who sounded similar to ours and came across Boston five-piece Drop Nineteens. They released two albums and a handful of EPs in the early '90s. This band is better known for the sound of its first album, Delaware, a shoegaze punk record that drew largely from Lush and My Bloody Valentine, but it's the other album, National Coma (Caroline Records), that I decided to purchase.

Coma has a more mature sound, having dropped most of the swirling, druggy guitars for a rawer indie punk sound. Like my band, and like the Pixies before them, they make very effective use of their boy/girl vocals. They clearly soaked in the Pixies' albums prior to recording Coma, and they may have even known them personally, being from the same town. And like the Pixies, Drop Nineteens were more successful in the U.K. than here in the States.

Singer Greg Ackell doesn't sound a lot like Frank Black, though; his vocal stylings are more reminiscent of Billy Corgan, or maybe somewhere in-between the two. And singer Megan Gilbert, who replaced Paula Kelley (who now heads the Paula Kelley Orchestra, in which Ackell participates) has a freshness to her voice that really draws the listener in. Both singers played guitar on Coma, as well.

Yesterday my wife and I were listening to this album in the car and I told her how much I'd fallen in love with it, how much I love it for its sheer creativity, and she agreed that it's a solid album. The snarls and screams, the sudden stops and starts, the crazy lyrics ("All Swimmers Are Brothers" borrows a few from the Flipper theme song!), the interplay between band members, the driving guitars and drums...from the opening call to arms ("Wake up!") through all thirteen tracks, it's a hell of a listen. I reminded her that she said she didn't like it last time I played it for her. Clearly it's grown on her. Which is good, since I find it very inspiring for our own band!

Ackell and Nineteens drummer Pete Koeplin formed a new band called Fidel after Coma, and they recorded a demo that was never released.

Two top tracks from National Coma, "Limp" and "Cuban", can be heard on their MySpace site (set up by a fan). I especially recommend the latter track, which starts off sweetly and then lets it all out.

They didn't make it very far, but Drop Nineteens are a band that I aspire for mine to be like.

There are at least two tracks from this album on YouTube currently, "Martini Love" and "Skull", both thanks to a fan calling him/herself "distortedfuzz". The former doesn't display Gilbert's vocals, so here's the latter, which does.