Black Soul by Gayze (2013)

"Record collectors shouldn't be in bands."  As I listened to Black Soul, the debut EP by the quasi-local project Gayze, I thought about this Joe Carducci quote.  I thought about it because Black Soul feels so self-conscious.  The whole thing comes across as an objet d'art made by collectors for collectors.

How else can one regard these fourteen minutes of sun-bleached tunes, fuzzy surf-guitar riffs, chunky acoustic strumming, unwavering 4/4 beats, trash organ and muffled, studiously detached, predominantly incomprehensible vocals?  This group--whose membership on record consists of David Wood and Gabe Rudow from the Boise band Teens and Cody Mauser from the San Antonio band the Rich Hands--seems hell-bent on making their record sound like some dusty, worn-out seven-inch that you stumbled across at the Record Exchange.  The shoe seems to fit even better when you consider that the only physical copies of Black Soul currently available (as far as I know) are 250 clear vinyl seven-inches.  If that doesn't scream, "COLLECTOR'S ITEM!", I don't know what does.

In a way, Black Soul makes me think of the change-up that Bob Dylan made when he released John Wesley Harding back in 1967.  At a time when things seemed to be falling apart and the center could not hold, Dylan put out an album that was all about Tradition and The Good Ol' Days: black-and-white band portrait on the cover, overwhelmingly acoustic instrumentation, lyrics that seemed to cry out for historical footnotes, jes' plain folk melodies.  Conversely, in a time when proponents of so-called Traditional Values (laissez-faire capitalism, fundamentalist Christian dogma, etc.) usurp, pervert and otherwise squander our resources, liberties and opportunities, Gayze releases a record that, from its acid-dropping cover art to its hazily menacing undertow, evokes a period in our nation's history when it felt as if everything was on the table and the future was out there for the taking.  In both cases, an idealized past seems to be invoked to compensate for--or, at the very least, distract from--an unsettling present.

But enough of this academic noodling (and, admittedly, rather reductive political analysis).  Bottom line: is Black Soul worth your time?  Well, there are certainly worse ways to spend fourteen minutes.  Aside from a few megabytes, it literally doesn't cost you anything to stream the record or download it via Bleeding Gold Records' Bandcamp page.  Also, as a guy who grew up listening to "Dead Man's Curve," "96 Tears," "Pipeline" and "I'm Waiting for the Man," I do find said fuzzy riffs and sun-bleached tunes pretty groovy when I give them a play.  Given their built-in obsolescence, however, I can't imagine that I'll play them that often.  As for buying the vinyl, if you wanna slip these guys a few bucks, good on ya.  But caveat emptor if you wonder what it'll get you on eBay in ten years.

Teens, Gayze, Art Fad and Deaf Kid @ the Red Room (12/29/12)

This show excited me because it gave me an opportunity to check out Gayze, a new project by local band Teens and Texas group the Rich Hands.  It also gave me the chance to see Teens again and (I hoped) get a better sense of their music.  Maybe their equipment wouldn't keep screwing up this time around, I thought.  At least the elevated stage would probably keep the crowd from crashing into them.

I counted thirty people when I arrived at the Red Room.  At least another twenty would brave the snow by the time that the show began.  Hipsters showing some heart--gives a cranky, snotty bastard hope for the future.

Deaf Kid kicked off the night.  Maybe it was just a matter of different sound systems, but this group sounded much edgier here than they did at the Flying M a few weeks back.  Their sunny guitars had a nice extra bit of distortion to them, and Matt Stone's drums sounded in especially strong form.  Their gliding groove got the crowd nodding to the beat and standing on chairs to get a look at the stage.

Art Fad played next.  Their grungy riffs, pummeling drums and snarled vocals incited the audience to do some friendly moshing.  Theo Maughan's raw bellow sounded good and fierce, and Jacob Milburn drummed with an admirable amount of energy for a guy who'd already performed three sets this night (he played a house show before coming here).  While it might have been nice if I could have parsed some more of their lyrics, their increasingly muscular sound signified maturity and articulation enough for now.

Up next was Gayze, whose lineup this night consisted entirely of Idaho dudes (including Jacob Milburn on drums).  Their blend of surf, garage and shoegaze wasn't spectacular, but it certainly wasn't bad.  The audience didn't seem to have any complaints either: they grooved out plenty to the dreamy tunes, intertwining guitars, pounding drums and weird-ass synthesizer noises.  My only real complaint is that they could've turned down the smoke machine a little: it grew so thick that I started getting a headache and couldn't see the projections on the screen behind them.

I will admit, though, that it did look pretty cool.

Teens closed out the night with a set that was blessedly free of their Manor show's technical difficulties.  With all the kinks worked out and all systems go, did this garage-rock group live up to the hype surrounding them?  Frankly, no--I can think of at least fifteen local bands right now who sing better, write better and play better.  More than many of the mid-to-late-60's emulators/imitators that I've heard this year, however, this band seems to honestly partake of the slovenly, freewheeling, joyous spirit that we've come to associate with Haight-Ashbury, Woodstock, etc (this wasn't just a matter of the psychedelic lines, shapes and colors flashing on the screen behind them either).  Ultimately, that spirit put their caterwauling vocals, twangy guitars and tidy little tunes across.  These guys came off as so open and friendly onstage that I couldn't begrudge them their ecstatic reception from the crowd (jumping, shouting, screaming).  They ain't no Soft White Sixties (or Bare Bones or Marshall Poole), but I'll take them over the Shivas.

You can find info on these groups on Facebook and elsewhere online.