Quick Before it Melts

Monday 18 May 2009

The Thermals, Now We Can See

“The Thermals have always been about celebrating negatives and positives in unison. If the world is going to hell, if we’re gonna die, if we can’t get laid, we’re still gonna have a good time. We think Now We Can See is our best record yet.”  So says Hutch Harris of The Thermals, and I would have to agree with him about Now We Can See being their best album yet, except it’s really the only one I’ve heard.  That, however, is soon going to be rectified, as I’m actively searching out their back catalogue, improving my life with their punky-pop urgency.

Now We Can See is one of the catchiest albums I’ve heard in a long time.  It’s also probably the loudest, but that’s par for the course.  What’s the point of playing power pop if you don;t play it loud?  As befits an album of this intensity and vibrancy, the songs are terse blast of buzz saw guitars and Harris’ shout-along singing doesn’t mince words; the songs get right down to the point and then sharpen it to a fine point.  “I Let It Go,” the album’s longest track at 3:38, still manages to cram in enough ideas to keep the listener breathless, all the way up to the no-holds-barred coda.  There’s plenty of like-minded moments throughout: “Now We Can See” reminds me of Pixies’ “Here Comes Your Man”, even though the two songs don’t share any sonic similarities; “When I Was Afraid” builds and build on a steady drum line, building tension with each verse, offering the  listener a brief respite in a passage where Harris’ vocals sound like their being shouted down a telephone line.

At seven seconds shy of 35 minutes, Now We Can See is over all too soon, but the consistency of all the tracks makes listening to the album on endless repeat endlessly easy.  If we are going to hell, as Hutch Harris says, then I’m going to ride in the car with The Thermals.  That one be one hell of a fun ride into eternal damnation.  And really, is there any better way to go, then to go with a smile on your face?

MP3: The Thermals “Now We Can See”
Myspace: The Thermals
Twitter: The Thermals
Facebook: The Thermals
Buy: The Thermals Now We Can See

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by J. Di Gioia | 1 Comment »

This entry was posted on Monday, May 18th, 2009 at 8:00 am and is filed under MP3. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.