Psycho & The Birds - All That Is Holy


One of the many, many Robert Pollard side projects that have popped up in recent years. This is an album you'll either love or hate right from the start. So the obvious question is, what makes this project different than any of Pollards other projects?

For this album he went back to his lo-fi roots and recorded all of these songs in a single sitting with his acoustic guitar on his old sears boombox. It appears that many of the songs were made up on the spot due to their rather loose structures and primitive vocals. The tapes were then sent to Todd Tobias (Pollard's long time collaborator) who added drums, lead guitar, synth and anything else he could find to these songs. The finished product is a rather interesting juxtaposition between spontenaity and a very well considered studio recording. The music stylistically sounds quite different than the usual Pollard affair: much more countified, much twangier and overall less emphasis on the vocals and melody and more about creating an interesting mood.

Interesting trivia: The first track "The Killers" ended up being re-recorded for Pollard's 2007 album Standard Gargoyle Decisions, and "Hello Forever" & "Frozen Fegtible Fiction" ended up being combined into one tune called "Cats Love A Parade" for Pollard's 2007 EP Silverfish Trivia.

3 comments:

decrepittapes said...

http://www.sendspace.com/file/n2try8

Welcome to Hard Times said...

You've got a great thing going here. Consistently good albums for a fan lo-fi recordings, particularly the wire post. Is that a bootleg or something?

I'm taking a shot at doing one of these music blogs for the first time. A lot of it does/will fall under the blanket of lo-fi. It would be great if you'd take a look. Definitely check out the Strange Boys 7".

Keep doing what you're doing.

http://welcometohardtimes.blogspot.com

Heavy River said...

Document & Eyewitness is not a bootleg, it is in fact an official Wire release that came directly after 154.

The concert was intended to be recorded on an 8-track (which would have made it much more professional sounding) but it was set up incorrectly and the whole thing was only captured on two tracks.

It would have been nice to hear some of these songs in better quality (which you can on Dome & Newman's solo albums) but I think the poor fidelity kind of plays a big role in capturing the spirit of the music which is total chaos.

I actually own that Strange Boys record. It's awesome! Keep it up!