by Brendan Youngquist, WCWS Music Director
They Were Wrong, So We Drowned
by Liars
I first heard about Liars a few years back, as one of about a hundred artists featured in my favorite article Rolling Stone ever published (look up “Indie Rock Universe”). They were grouped as part of the celestial body titled “Spazmodica”, with the subtitle “Turn and face the strange–––interstellar wierdos fly high”. Now that I have actually listened to them, after stumbling upon their debut record, They Were Wrong, So We Drowned, in our archives, I see why they would have been described as “spastic” and “chaotic”, but I also hear much more. This is an extremely honest record by a striking and challenging group, which will simultaneously give rise to intrigue as well as aversion. If moved to describe their sound in terms of genre, I would be limited to the words “minimalist techno-punk”, but the magic in this record comes from its sheer radical (some might say “barbaric”) honesty. Moments which might in another context be called “angsty” here instead confront and overwhelm the listener with powerful animalism. From its elusive tribal-acid drum samples, to its spontaneous releases of distorted noise, to its ranting punk chants, Liars certainly present with this record something of a challenge, but a rewarding one at that. If you’re looking for music by a group of honest artists, give this record a shot. Key tracks: “If You’re A Wizard Then Why Do You Wear Glasses?” and “Read The Book That Wrote Itself”.
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From St. Petersburg With Love
by Julia Vorontsova
From St. Petersburg With Love is an ample package of 24 dark and sparse serenades from Russian songwriter and world-traveler Julia Vorontsova. Throw this on some cloudy morning, and quietly fall into a spell of cold and yet touching indifference, of a depth with which no amount of window-gazing and cigarrette smoking can keep up. The record is sung primarily in Russian, and I almost don’t want to know what she’s saying———it only adds to the viel of eastern European mystery shrouding these moody tunes.
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“Indie Rock Universe” – Rolling Stone
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