Lemonade - Lemonade
Lemonade - Lemonade
[True Panther, 2008]
Maybe because of Bubblegum Lemonade, or maybe because of the drink name itself, but you really expect Lemonade to be all twee-pop and sweet. What you get though is a box full of aggressive and jumpy post-punk. The main thing about this debut of San Francisco/Brooklyn trio is danceability. Six tracks only, but starting with the opener, Big Weekend, you get the rhythms of fun as it should be. This is definitely a crazy-party music: Chinese New Year fireworks of Madison Square Garden and the likes… Callan Clendenin’s vocals sound at times a bit sickly and random, like on the industrial rhythms of Unreal, or, at most times, just pure careless and noisy. And the drummer Alex Pasternak must be having fun all the time - banging on everything within his reach.
All in all, Lemonade is noisy, loud and pushy. And at the same time, pretty digestible. Arabic motives (world music is everywhere these days) on Nasifon, a simple 4/4 beat on Blissout - whatever you pick, there’s an internally growing desire to dance. Well, that’s exactly what this music is for.
Read & Listen:
Lemonade Myspace
Should this album hit me sooner, Everything Beautiful Reminds Me Of You would be on 
Suburban Kids With Biblical Names have their fourth EP out, with a usual and simple name, #4. What stays? The same off-key sining, the same joyfulness and playful moods. What has changed? Lo-fi sounding is not so lo-fi anymore. Home-made arrangements changed to a more technically sophisticated disco-beats. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still sweet and nice. But the EP does sound very much like another Swede, Jens Lekman. Home pants and slippers are over, now it’s not a Sunday suit, but still something to wear to school. The EP opens with 1999 - synthetic rhythms and dogs barking on the background. Studenter På Flak has a more romantic feel to it, with whistling in-between signing. Europa has soft, mellow guitars, it’s a simple and easy-going song. And the final track is a beautiful World Music song, with african rhythms brought to the general Swedish indie pattern of the EP. All in all, Johan Hedberg and Peter Gunnarson sound very much like themselves, a bit more polished than they used to, but still good old “kids next door” type, playful and happy.
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Symptoms is the second album of a couple Sasu Ripatti and Antye Greie-Fuch (a.k.a. Vladislav Delay/Luomo and AGF). Moderately danceable music, cold female vocal, clicks and clacks - this is the main thing about this techno/pop experiment. Antye whispers on Outbreak and Most Beautiful, gives a warning “something is always wrong” on Bulletproof. The variety of emotions is wide, but at the same time not that vivid. Downtown Snow is by far the most “pop” track of all: