Quick Spins: The Ghost Is Dancing, Band Of Skulls, Plastiscines
By Tankboy in Arts & Entertainment on Jul 14, 2009 8:20PM
In which we take a quick look at a few recent musical releases.
The Ghost Is Dancing
Battles On
The Toronto collective The Ghost Is Dancing traffics in grandiosity. The title of their album, Battles On, could very well describe their whole approach to music as they stuff their mini-anthems with enough expansive longing reaching upward and outward while the musicians struggle to rein the compositions in and keep them from exploding into mediocre sentimentality. Moments of quiet reflection inevitably build into mighty crescendos that would grate if they didn't seem just so point on, perfect, satisfying, and necessary. We suspect some might compare them to a group like Arcade Fire in their aspirarations, but we thing the group's ambition is directed elsewhere. The seem earnest and grand because they are honestly striving to reach their own great heights; not match anyone else's.
Band Of Skulls
Baby Darling Doll Face Honey
Band of Skulls offers up that brand of electric blues rock so popular with white British ax men of the late '60s. Most off the male female vocal melodies closely shadow the lead guitar lines throughout this album and after the first two songs we were having a hard time distinguishing these tunes from any offered by the pack of bands aping The White Stripes Formula in hopes of a quick rise to stardom. Were every song like that this album would be a failure in our ears, but when the group turns up the boogie on the perky "I Know What I Am" or slows down the beat as on the plaintive "Fires" it becomes obvious that while Band Of Skulls has created themselves in another's image, they show promise when they distance themselves from their progenitors.
The four ladies in Plastiscines channel the self-assured sneer of Nancy Sinatra through their new-wave punk ditties to create catchy mini-anthems dedicated to attitude. About Love is the group's second domestically released album and it turns up the hooks, increases the tunes sung in english, and, with the exception of a single misplaced ballad, delivers winning bursts of song that plow through your ears leaving the faint sensation of pleasure without any lasting effect. We recently saw the band power through a live set at Bottom Lounge and are pleased to report that the slight sheen of the album gets crushed under glittered heel onstage.