Rescued From Obscurity

AUGUST 18, 1997:  If you follow bands like Pearl Jam or Nine Inch Nails, you probably don't have a problem finding out what they're up to--a cursory glance at the entertainment periodicals is enough to discover plans for new albums, future tours, and any other project that may be in the works. But if the groups you follow are less popular--or downright obscure--then you tend to be out of the loop. Unless a band happens to release a new record, they could, for all you know, be broken up and back working at Denny's while you wait around like the last man at the bus stop.

If someone had asked me a few months ago what had happened to San Francisco's Swell and Nova Scotia's Sloan--two bands that graced my 1994 "best of" list--I would've bet money that they had played their last notes. Yet here they are, each back with new releases, and each with a different approach to their craft.

Swell actually were down for the count, having been released from their label, American Records, after the poor sales of their last album, the remarkable 41. The band's sound--marked by rat-a-tat drumrolls, tightly picked acoustic guitar rhythms, fuzzed-out lead guitar, and spacy vocals--just couldn't wedge its way into a modern-rock radio format dominated by bombast, rage, and sloppiness. Stung by a royalty deal that required Swell to release records on American, bandmembers David Freel and Monte Vallier contemplated regrouping under a different name with a different personality.

Instead, they left San Francisco and booked studio time in New York and L.A. With 10 tracks in the can, they struck a deal with Beggar's Banquet (a kind of purgatory for well-intentioned bands--Buffalo Tom, The Fall, and The Wedding Present have all trod water there). Now Swell have put out what may be their best album--a tight collection of well-worked songs alive with presence and passion.

Judging by the sound of Too Many Days Without Thinking, Swell's travails didn't shake their confidence or their sound; this is unmistakably a Swell album, right down to the rat-a-tats. At the same time, the group has opened up its music a little from the dark, confined spaces of 41. The record has a warmer tone, and more songs work in major keys and up tempos. The vocals, too, are a little sharper, even if the lyrics remain firmly lodged in the stratosphere of obscurity.

In fact, even songs with seemingly straightforward titles like "What I Always Wanted" and "Fuck Even Flow" veer off into the ether. The lyrics of the former tune simply alternate between the title and the line "Now I'm failing to come down," before switching to a litany of regrets. The latter is a recital of non sequiturs that seemingly have nothing to do with the monster Pearl Jam hit referenced in the title. (It's also the band's catchiest song and, perversely, their most profane.)

This is what makes Swell's music so compelling. Their feet are firmly planted, while their heads are off having adventures they can only half-relate. If they refuse to change much, it's only because they're happy with who they are. When they catch hold of a song as fresh and original as "When You Come Over"--which features a guitar that skips across the vocals like a rock traversing a pond--the listener is pretty happy to meet the band on their own turf.

- Noel Murray


 

Swell's New Release Encourages Smoking and Thinking

Too Many Days Without Thinking is a catchy album title, but not exactly an apt description of Swell's approach to writing music and lyrics. Continuing in the band's acoustic-electric vein, this disc is another moody piece of organic poetry from the slack-pop scene. The members of Swell, on that scene since the late '80s, are one of the San Francisco's unsung heroes. They have hit the head of the music business nail again -- albeit softly -- with their fourth full-length release. Solid through and through, this disc will nonetheless be ignored by radio and the general public for the most part.

Recorded over a period of 18 months in L.A., San Francisco and New York, Too Many Days has a lot in common with the band's first three albums, but just enough personality to make it a step forward. With more electricity surging through the guitars, and nice vocal harmonies, this Beggars Banquet/Psycho Specific release fits nicely into Swell's catalogue. This album won't put them on the pop music charts, MTV or the minds of most teenaged Americans, but that's not their intention.

Lo-fi, low key guys with a sense of cool grooves and smart-but-not-smarmy lyrics, Swell doesn't wanna change the world or move into the limelight so many other bands crave. Unafraid to take on hard tasks, the band went through a handful of producers, studios, recording locations and cartons of cigarettes, according to their fanzine, Swollen, before completing the album and getting it out on Beggars. Rick Rubin's American Recordings had rejected the album after a two-month listening period (the band theorizes in Swollen that the tape might have gotten lost in Rubin's beard), so Beggars picked it up, as they had with the band's third album, 41.

Singer/songwriter/guitarist David Freel is somewhat of a poet, a term that some rockers may fear, but one that he apparently does not. Certainly many people over the years have been called "poet," some aptly, many not. In Freel's case, however, the shoe fits. He writes clever, witty, sometimes depressing tales of love, travel, drugs, anger, what have you. And while his vocal range is limited, this makes his words more effective. His almost deadpan delivery serves to highlight his wry wit and clever turns of phrases. On the album's opener, "Throw the Wine," he laments: "I got a madness that stumbles and climbs / Three hundred good days and sixty-six crimes." His lyrics are supported by spare, sometimes haunting, music. The jazzy drumming of Sean Kirkpatrick (with some by Clem Waldmann), casual bass of Monte Vallier and slide guitar flourishes give a smoky feel to some of the tunes. This band paints a well-defined aural picture, evoking images of wet city streets, late night lovers' quarrels and lazy trips to the 24-hour Denny's.

Freel's songs are more like short stories, and his characters quite often slip into cynicism and bitterness. On "Bridgette, You Love Me," Freel sings: "Somewhat down but sure to get by / We're living on my paper route, it's alright." This is a guy who's stuck in a rut, but determined to persevere through his lamentable life. In "At Lennie's," a song about a certain inner-brain trip, the narrator says, right off the bat, "God loves you / And I hate that."

The band did have a minor alt-radio hit a few years back in "At Long Last," and there are certainly tunes on Too Many Days that could have some success on the ever-growing number of sound-alike radio stations nationwide. The CD's opener, "Throw the Wine," has a hazy/lazy feel that would sound great at an MTV beach party, if the people involved had a clue. The groove of "F**ck Even Flow" is so simple, pure and infectious it's hard to believe it hasn't been adopted for a car commercial or twentysomething TV show. Not that this would necessarily be a good thing; it would however be ironic, considering Swell's noncommercial ways.

- Dave Brigham



If this album is the product of not thinking, it would benefit the world if more artists decided not to apply their brain matter to forming pop music. Perhaps the nod for grey-matter flexibility should go to the independent label, Beggars Banquet, for releasing an album full of intricately composed, ear-pleasing music. More appropriately, the nods should be directed at the three-person combination known as Swell.

"Throw the Wine," excites the cockles of any radio-sick cynic's heart, by skimming the edges of normality while arriving in that rare area between standard pop music and music innovation. Swell uses common instruments to produce almost common sounds, but there is something that is hard to pin down, that separates this music from the regular schlock that invades so many parts of this common world.

The uncommon interplay between the instruments continues on the second track, "What I Always Wanted." The song moves from a joyous drum pattern to a steady pop chorus, all the while repeating the lines, "I am failing to come down."

Swell refuses to stoop down to a level of mediocrity, with the song "Fuck Even Flow," which barely hangs onto its own bass drum backbeat. "(I Know) The Trip," is a close contender with "Throw the Wine" for the highlight of the disc. Both compositions plead the listener to participate in one or all of the following activities: singing with either the repetitive back up vocals, or take on the arduous task of learning the lyrics; humming either tune during an early morning shower; and/or accompanying the band with 'air' drumming.

It is unnecessary to blow air into this album. Reviews such as this one simply vituperate music that should really be left alone to speak for itself.

- Jordan Mitchell




"I got a madness that stumbles and climbs, 300 good days and 66 crimes, too late for progress I'm so far behind, do me the favour of washing my mind."

With its roots in the off-kilter new wave rock of Talking Heads circa 1977 (although much less manic), this is devoutly cult American indie to file alongside the likes of Pavement and Buffalo Tom. The San Francisco-based Swell (Monte Vallier, bass; Sean Kirkpatrick, drums and sleeve art; David Freel, guitar and vocals), have been around since about 1990 and started to get noticed in the UK in 1992 when they did a session for John Peel and released their second LP ...well? This fourth LP is a slow grower and on the first couple of listens you could be forgiven for thinking there were only a couple of decent tunes. But Swell are much more complex and musically varied than you first realise. Tracks like the floaty, gently acoustic 'Fuck Even Flow' occasionally get the pace going from a grungy drone to an indie high spot and the single '(I Know) The Trip' has a squealing, grinding guitar riff and loud, shouting catchy chorus which is the high spot of the album. But the rest is far from filler - it just takes time to get to you and eventually you'll be swooning to the sound of 'Bridgette, You Love Me', a delicate acoustic ballad that at first you might have overlooked. Sometimes the best music can be like that.

(RT)



USC Daily Trojan


How would we get through life without the little, sometimes forgettable, pleasurable moments? Things we don't really think about until we're doing them and then we immediately think we should do this more often. The little moments that we don't talk about doing, but help us finish the day. For some, it could be drinking a cool glass of lemonade on a hot and breezy summer day. For others, it could be a stroll through the park, a viewing of a favorite childhood film, or just listening to cherished record once again.

Swell's Too Many Days Without Thinking conjures up these kinds of moments.

No, not in the lyrics, for David Freel's analyses on this album take frighteningly real looks at the deception of relationships and what we all fool ourselves into thinking about our own lives.

On one track Freel can't figure out why he stayed in a relationship ("Throw the Wine"), and later can't figure out why he's attracted to someone ("Make Mine You").

Maybe he doesn't want the trouble of finding someone new, or maybe he just wants to convince himself of something that isn't real as he sings "Having less of what we came for / Having more of what we like". He doesn't know, and neither do we. Then later, he regretfully looks down on someone else for sticking with a bad partner.

It all comes together on the album's climax, "(I Know) The Trip." In this song, Freel thinks he has everyone else figured out.

"(I Know) The Trip" is like a long bus ride, where one might instantly draw up lives for everyone around themselves based solely on physical features.

But, Freel realizes everyone around him is criticizing him and he struggles to see exactly where he fits in. He admits he was "rich and jealous to start," as is everyone he's criticizing.

The feel of the album is like recalling a sometimes forgettable, yet pleasurable, moment. Freel's vocals entice the listener to pay more attention, and even when he screams--as he does on the chorus of "Throw the Wine," when he comes to the realization that he let his relationship linger too long--he's shouting at a whisper.

The guitars swirl in and out as if they were being pushed along by a slow moving fan. Even when Swell reaches the occasional powerful chorus, the lead guitars echo like they were being slammed with feathers.

Swell slowly circles around the listener, but never lets us get too close. We leave wishing we could have more, and we put the album down, telling ourselves we'll have to listen to it again someday. After all, it was enjoyable.

But before we've filed it away, we've forgotten exactly what it was that made us enjoy this album. In a way, it's kind of mysterious, which is never a bad thing.

The songs are never really conventional, yet never really experimental. Swell seems to be stuck somewhere in-between the world of independent rock and commercial rock.

This is best demonstrated by the song "When You Come Over," whose opening recalls even the toughest Guided By Voices segment, but then switches into a dusty storm of guitars and drums--each follows its own path down completely different directions.

Swell's Too Many Days Without Thinking is a pleasurable album, but honestly, it isn't something we'll remember or hum in the middle of a workday. So, buy it used and enjoy it, or maybe you'd rather indulge yourself in an ice filed glass of lemonade.

B

- Todd Martens

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