Long summer evenings grow into lazy evenings when the shadows grow long and the streets glow purple. The sound of children playing late drifts across the backyards of lethargic guitar strumming pot heads. Despite the folk rock basis of much of Swell's song writing there's something about the atmosphere their best songs create that is slightly unreal. Their folksiness has been filtered through snappy new wave sensibilities and given some spooky twists. At their most mundane, as on Throw The Wine, they simply deliver skilfully crafted downtempo songs. At their best, the following What I Always Wanted they tug at the heartstrings and deja vu centres with mysterious hazy atmospheres all their own.





It's a pleasure to hear a rock band that has not only a unique sound but also original sensibilities about its music and its art. You might be tempted to drop the San Francisco-based band Swell into the "art rock" genre, but that wouldn't do justice to the cohesive musicality infused throughout its soon-to-be-released fourth album, "Too Many Days Without Drinking".

This guitar, bass and drums trio establishes strong, rhythmic grooves that lay the foundation for the fluidly mesmerizing guitar and harmonized vocals that are central elements of the album. Tracks on "Too Many Days Without Drinking" range from subtly melodious melancholy to complex, psychedelia. Even with the reverberations of Annie Lennox-inspired indie-pop, folk rock and ambient buried in their music, Swell has still managed to produce a rock album of conceptual unity.

Swell's attempt to generate a multifaceted response to their music is aided by the contrast of satisfyingly rocking instrumentation with evocative, sincere lyrics. "I want to take you down /and find out /what is on your mind," sings guitarist David Freel in "Bridgette, You Love Me," articulating the emotional forces that drive the album.

Swell is telling us what is on its members' minds - the love and despair of their lives - but there is also a verbalized desire that the exploratory experience of interaction between the album and the listener be somehow understood another way, beyond the world of the listener's ego. Only then does the album begin to take on form as an entity that has its own emotions and experiences to relate, and it is the precision and accuracy with which Swell has crafted the album that brings me to label it art.

With the track "Fuck Even Flow," Swell consciously rejects the repetitious formula that can lead even an indie-rock cult band to mainstream success. Judging from the fact that this is the band's fourth album in six years, I'd say it has won its point - a band that makes its music into art may not become arena megastars, but there will always be enough supportive people who think that sort of artistic integrity is - I can't resist - just swell.

- Zachary Roberts



They're Simply Swell!

"Well, we walked out on Donovan," admits Swell's David Freel, attempting an explanation as to why their previous label, American Recordings, refused to release their terrific new album, Too Many Days Without Thinking. "Maybe Rick [Rubin] saw us leaving. Or maybe he knew we wouldn't sell two billion copies. They do need a hit."

Despite losing a label, a year and a few pissed-off gray hairs, Swell, also featuring bassist Monte Vallier and drummer Sean Kirkpatrick, stayed in stride, finding an enthusiastic new imprint--Beggars Banquet--to release their record, their fourth, and maintaining a resolute confidence in their ability to produce excellent music.

"We spent two years making the record," says Freel. "It took time to work out what we we wanted. It was simply a matter of time." Freel and the band worked more or less continuously on the record without ruining it in the process. "We just waited for something to click."

41, the band's previous album was recorded in DIY fashion three years ago in a San Francisco warehouse. Lo-fi and dangerous, the band proved they could write fractured indie rock with unsettling and abstract dynamics; critics and friends alike say it takes five listens to get a good grip on a Swell record. Freel's passionate and intuitive songwriting borders on poetic abstraction, though without sounding pretentious. "I really want people to like it the first time they hear it," he says. "But...maybe this new one will only take three spins to get it."

Produced in part by Kurt Ralske at Zabriskie Point in New York City, Too Many Days Without Thinking explodes Swell's lo-fi standard with a barrage of high-grade sonics and throat-clutching impact. Mesmerizing tracks like "What I Always Wanted" and the Pink Floyd-ish "Sunshine, Everyday" mix enchanting hooks with provocative lyrics to create a product that, according to Freel, emerges somewhat miraculously.

"The music and lyrics come to me at the same time," says Freel matter-of-factly. "When I pick up the guitar and I'm in the right frame of mind, I find myself playing a song I've never played before. I sing what comes to mind, as if my mind is improvising, as if some part of my brain knows what's going on, but I don't. It's like someone's controlling my fingers, and I start playing chords I don't even know."

- Bob Gulla




Imagine finding yourself floating in the ocean, just past the break, where rhythmic swells roll underneath your body - you're dreaming. You dive under the surface and discover a shadowy rootless world; but the current propels you upward, and when you resurface, waves crash on your brain, and you rage with it, sway with it. You return to consciousness, wiping the crust from your eyes, and like any good dream, you wish you could go back to it. So you put Swell in your CD player and realize they can take you there.

Three years after the release of 41 (American), the San Francisco-based Swell is back with their fourth full-length release, Too Many Days Without Thinking. During the interim between albums, the band and a few of their songs appeared in a Showtime feature, Duke Of Groove, and they recorded a creepy cover of "Golden Years" for Crash Course for the Ravers: A Tribute to the Songs of David Bowie.

On Too Many Days..., Swell sketches a guitar-driven, moody atmosphere, adding layers, then taking them away. The words, embedded in David Freel's smooth, low voice, mingle with saturated basslines. Meanwhile, guitar riffs flood your ears with throbbing droplets, and all of this is contained, so as not to make a mess, by minimal drum beats.

Preserving the balance between melancholy and fury, the first song, "Throw the Wine," starts off slow and rhythmic, then the chorus kicks in with a quicker tempo and distorted guitars; and just as abruptly as they bring it up, they take it back down, then up again, until the two meet - not in the middle, but at both extremes. They use a similar technique on "What I Always Wanted," alternating between an intense, hollow feeling of hold-your-breath-anticipation reminiscent of the Jaws theme and a relieving acoustic melody. Rather than using the chorus to rehash or magnify the song's mood, Swell uses it to reveal an opposing emotion.

Swell's lyrics are interesting and thoughtful, bordering on depressing, but never causing depression. Example: on "At Lennie's," Freel sings, "God loves you, and I hate that, and I'm wishing sin, tomorrow/And we're aimless, and not chosen, and we're laughing/Don't mention why, don't feed that cry, I own the words you only borrow." Too Many Days... is as much about lyrics as it is music. It reminds me of the movie Eddie and the Cruisers when Eddie crosses his fingers to show how words and music go together. "Words and music," he says. "Words and music."

- Barbara Restaino (Lollipop)



This album is the first full length release after nearly 4 years of silence from the band and marks the 4th chapter of the bands recording history. Taking its title from a single of the same name released on Sub Pop records not long after their last album "41" was released Too Many Days Without Thinking represents a growing maturity or rather progression of the bands sound and direction. The most noticeable change is that of production values, TMDWT sees swell using alot more distorted voice effects and where past albums have featured more electric guitars overlaying accoustic this time round they are layering accoustic over electric. Swell seethe with a subtle intensity, threatening to take control of your nervous system reinstalling and confirming any belief that indeed life is bitter, but rather than repelling they encourage you to drink it up. Swell have one of the best drum sounds in the world. There. Said it. Done. Having said this though it is not nessecarily the drums that carry the beat as the guitars establish a sense of rythm and a beat unto themselves that the drum seems to imitate in many ways.The albums second track, "What i Allways Wanted" takes over from the distorto guitars of the first track, reinstalling the sublime mood familiar with most of swells recordings yet lulls you into a false sense of security as most of the songs on this album contain bitter 'just restrained' songs of suppressed anger, bitternes and beauty, themes often running hand in hand in the one song. "Bridgette You Love Me" is one of the nicest most sincere love songs I have heard in a while, and the first I have heard directed at ones own dog. This followed by another deceivingly beautiful song which under closer inspection is about a car accident, is a good indication of the bands ability to hide dark themes under a veneer of subtlety and sublime beauty.

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