#pretty years

[30000songs]

#1,157 - Pretty Years - Cymbals Eat Guitars

Nothing pretty here.

35/100

[everyonegetshugsandturnsintotang]

Visit Original Link

Take to bed the endless loop inside my head

[spectaclegazer]

[fuckyeaheffectspedals]

Ya boy @evanpatricklynch with the ridiculously sick board! This rules. 

[framing-the-picture]

This track is groovy as fuck and why is it not a bigger thing in the indie-music-sphere this year???

[framing-the-picture]

Oh hey, here’s another song that’s a big late game Favorite Songs of the Year shakeup for me

[dontchaknow]

[theeverlastingshade]

Cymbals Eat Guitars- Pretty Years Tour

            Last week I caught a Cymbals Eat Guitars show at The Loving Touch in Ferndale as they were touring in support of their stellar 2016 record Pretty Years. By now Cymbals Eat Guitars certainly know how to play to their strengths, and they performed a show that highlighted their impressive melodic sensibilities and anthemic musicianship with stunning precision. The show didn’t yield any surprises, and with a band like this you pretty much know exactly what you’re getting into. With that being said, their anthems of self-doubt and inner turmoil were delivered with a heightened intensity that elevated their arrangements to a level of catharsis beyond what they deliver on their albums. They put on a thrilling show that was characteristically emblematic of the vitality that rock is still capable of delivering to those who still look to music as a means of coping with the harsh realities of daily existence.

           Before Cymbals Eat Guitars took the stage they had two bands open for them, starting with Wildhoney. Wildhoney was a pretty standard noise pop band with one drummer, a bassist, three guitarists and a vocalist. They weren’t anything particularly special, some decent melodies here and there, but the vocals were consistently buried under fuzz, and the songs would just kind of hum along without a tremendous amount of tension ever really coming to the forefront. Not bad per se, just fairly middle-of-the-road and forgettable. Field Mouse came on after them, and definitely took things up a few dozen notches. They were a dreamy indie rock group with a drummer, a bassist, and three guitarists, one of which sang lead vocals, and another had backing vocals and played keyboard as well. Field Mouse didn’t necessarily blow me away, but they played with a notable intensity, had strong melodic instincts, a good sense of rhythm, and delivered some sharp hooks. Their lead guitarist was particularly talented and would nimbly shred through the occasional solo, and their vocalist had a cool, wispy voice that seamlessly blended in with their sonics. Despite knowing nothing about them beforehand they’re now a group that I’ll be keeping my eye on in the future.

            Shortly after Field Mouse left the stage Cymbals Eat Guitars began setting up their gear, and within minutes they began to open with “Place Names”. At this point in time the band consists of Andrew Dole on drums, Matt Whipple on bass and backing vocals, Brian Hamilton on keyboards, synth, and backing vocals, and frontman/founding member Joseph D’Agostino playing guitar and singing lead vocals. The group has gone through a few different lineup changes, but they’ve had this lineup since 2013, and thus the band’s last two records (as well as their strongest records) LOSE and Pretty Years were both recorded by this same lineup of musicians. The level of confidence that they play with was apparent from the moment they began performing, and “Place Names” rang with electrifying precision, from D’Agostino’s commanding vocal presence throughout the chorus to the stunning guitar solo and thumping bass lines that interlock throughout the coda. It was an immediate indication of how seamless the band members are able to perform with one another, simultaneously doing justice to their compositions while expanding on the studio counterparts.

            That’s not to say that the songs were even remotely unrecognizable, it’s just that the scale to which they were performed rose immensely. Songs like “Laramie”, “…And the Hazy Sea”, and “Jackson” were blown up even larger than their studio counterparts, with lengthier solos, more dynamic instrumental interplay, and extended codas that allowed them to take weightier, more chaotic forms. The majority of their set came from LOSE and Pretty Years, and while the occasional early gem like “…And the Hazy Sea” received some representation, they leaned far heavier on their later music which makes sense given the makeup of the band. That being said, the set was stacked with the finest songs that these two albums have to offer. “Warning”, an easy highlight, was just as frantic live, with some of the evening’s most rousing singing, infectious guitar riffs, and powerful drum rolls. The set’s pacing was distributed nicely, and while songs like “Close” and “4th of July Philadelphia (Sandy)” kept the momentum moving along, “Mallwalking” and “Finally” brought the tempo down while showcasing the delicacy of their arrangements and how well layered much of their music is.

            The last song of the main set that they played was “Laramie”, one of their strongest songs to date. It’s an eight minute song that starts slowly with D’Agostino’s wail wrapping itself around layers of keyboard squelches, jagged riffs, and ride cymbal slams before morphing into a cathartic release of pent up angst and confrontational belting. The song was more impressive live than it comes off on record; the tense, built up energy releasing in a far more intense coda that seemed to include a bit of improvisation but was tighter, and far more meticulous than anything I’ve ever heard them play. After “Laramie” the band left the stage only for D’Agostino to return a few minutes later with an acoustic guitar for a solo performance of “Child Bride” to wrap their set up. While this was certainly one of the weakest offerings of the night it was still a welcome variation of tempo and sonics, and a fitting conclusion to their performance nonetheless.

            When all said and done the show that they performed was one of the best straight up rock shows that I’ve seen in quite some time, and a testament to the leaps and bounds that D’Agostino’s bedroom project has come since the days of Why There Are Mountains. For anyone that enjoys legitimate through-and-through indie rock I simply cannot recommend seeing this band enough. With each successive album of theirs they’ve grown stronger as a band, and are now not only at the height of their musicianship thus far, but considerably ahead of the pack of bands that play emotionally driven, guitar based music. Within the landscape of indie rock as it exists in 2016 it simply does not get much better than Cymbals Eat Guitars.