PANDA PARK

So I’m raiding my kid’s CD collection again, trolling for new stuff to listen to and finding way more prog metal than I even thought existed, plus an Arcade Fire CD I thought I’d lost. Damn kids. And then I come across this thing. Never heard of them, had to look them up to find out what they are. Math rock. Never heard of it. Had to look it up to find out what it is. Interesting. Weird meters, dissonant riffs, somewhat superfluous vocals. Thanks Wikipedia. I guess that qualifies as progressive, although this sounds a lot more like an indie band with a poor sense of timing than anything else.

That’s not to say there aren’t some notable moments, just not enough of them to make this very meaningful (or even interesting) music. The mildly Bowiesque vocals on “Silver and Snow” are decent, and the awkward guitar on that track is actually kind of catchy after several listens. The atonal chords on “Chronological Disorder” are a bit seductive in a slow-motion car wreck kind of way. The vocals on that one sound eerily close to a guy named Ronn Goedert from the band White Witch back in the seventies (remember “Class of 2000”)? And the piano is very good throughout, especially on the opening track “Even Time Ghost Can't Stop Wag” – great title, by the way.

But all in all this is more of an exercise in clever tempo sequences and erratic guitar progressions that wander more than progress, really. I’m underwhelmed. I’m sure fans of the band find them irresistible and all, but I can’t imagine a neophyte listening to this and being instantly won over. I read a couple reviews that compare them to Slint, and I see some resemblances, mostly in the vocals on the latter tracks and the odd timing, but that’s about it. These guys are a lot more mellow for sure.

So by definition this seems to be a fans-only album, which means two stars. Oh well, at least my kid spent his money instead of mine.

peace