Young Henry

Self-titled CS

FLA

Genre: bled out

Minneapolis, MN

June 2010

There are actually two completely separate bands named Young Henry out there today; one is a noise act from Britain, while the other one – the Young Henry currently in question -- plays a sort of home-taped shoegazer fare, characterized by oddly catchy pop fragments. If you're craving a chuckle, take a gander at the Young Henry last.fm page for a glimpse into the war of words being waged between the two disparate acts. On this debut tape for FLA, the listener can expect ardently lo-fi recordings of tape-bleeding guitar chords and obfuscated vocals. I'm intrigued but not entirely blown away by the sound; the band revels in a sort of quirky melodicism, as seen in top form on noise-poppy "Citadels & Atrament" and punchy "Meandering Amognst Continuance." At times they inject a (post-)punky urgency to the mix ("Makeshift Epoch" & "Six Ceases" -- both the third track on either side), which helps keep the momentum up. But my lack of uber-excitement stems from the rather matter-of-fact nature of this tape; the songs don't blow you away -- instead they're just sort of there. Only the bouldering cavalcade of "Cavalcade" really grips you by the collarbone and smacks you around, but that may be largely on account of its deciballistic noise advantage.

young henry's myspace

Michael Tau

[Vitals: 8 tracks, distributed by the label, released 2010]