The Control Group

People Eating People

admin — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 09:00:00 +0000

So, back in the day, I was in a struggling band in Seattle. And back in that day, one of the biggest breaks a struggling band could get was getting a blurb written about them in The Stranger, the local indie newspaper (edited by none other than Dan Savage, of “Savage Love” fame). While my band was scrambling between shows, staying up way too late at practice, and generally creating plenty of VH1 Behind the Music drama, another band was stealing all of the time in The Stranger: Mon Frere.

When members of my band said their name, it sounded like it should be in italics and in caps, just because we said it through gritted teeth in a mean voice, as in, “Oh, how sweet, Mon Frere got another piece in The Stranger!” (Not that our music could even really be compared—my band and Mon Frere sounded just about as similar as Elton John and Black Flag). So, I admit that when I saw Nouela Johnston went solo and has a new album with her solo act, People Eating People, I was all over it! Heck Yes! Revenge!

Well, here are the facts: I really like People Eating People. I was fully planning on hearing something that I’d heard before (piano plus angst multiplied by the square root of Tori Amos, post-Strange Little Girls, roughly equals something irritating), but People Eating People is really, really good. I don’t even have to totally hold myself back from gritting my teeth as I agree with Stranger columnist Megan Seling. Johnston’s sound lies with Fiona Apple (minus my mom asking me if I’m feeling okay when I’m listening to her), Regina Spektor (minus the kitsch), and Amanda Palmer (minus those funky tattooed eyebrows). Only (sigh!) I like her more than all of the previous three. There. I said it.

“For Now” makes me teary-eyed in a way that Fiona Apple could only do back when I was about sixteen. “Rain, Rain” is funky and quirky without being obnoxiously so (and yes, even Spektor can overdo the quirky at times). I like Amanda Palmer quite a lot, but Johnston just about slays her with a jazzy bravado and riffing on the old jazz standard “Summertime” in her song “Let’s Rage.” And, finally, let’s face it: She just kills with her wickedly fantastic lyricism. Take “Supernatural Help”: “I don’t need supernatural help/I can fuck things up myself.” Well put.

What makes People Eating People work is that Johnston keeps things simple, letting her voice and her piano speak by themselves when appropriate, and bringing in drums and other accouterments only when they are needed. Gee, she’s so great that I don’t even have to be jealous that Matt Bayles mastered her disc. He only was responsible for mixing, engineering, or producing (or all three) bands like Botch, Mastodon, The Murder City Devils, and Pearl Jam, to name but a few. Not me. I’m just not the jealous type.

Written by: Emily S. Dunster, January 30th 2010

Love Is Not Pop

admin — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 09:04:00 +0000

By El Perro del Mar

The Control Group

While listening to the recently released album from Swedish pop artist El Perro del Mar (Sarah Assbring), I quickly realized I was being pulled into a cathartic experience evoked by Assbring's ethereal vocals and repetitive, melancholic lyrics. Starting with the track “Gotta Get Smart” and ending with “A Better Love,” the songs hold true to the healing process of a breakup, especially the desperate hold of a co-dependent first love.

As the title provokes, Love Is Not Pop is not cute; it is pain, loneliness, desperation, heartbreak, losing yourself, finding yourself, and after having wept, hope. For the artist, the album is about “the dream of a pure love in a dirty world.” Unlike many other similar artists with equally melancholic lyrics, Assbring sings her hurt, exposing a vulnerability to her listeners that is at times comforting and uncomfortable because of the intimacy it offers—and, perhaps unknowingly, requests.

“Gotta Get Smart” is undeniably the most important song on the album. It’s about the moment in time when you finally realize you’re done. This decided confidence comes through the somber, repetitive lyrics: “We’ve been together for so long. Don’t wanna break you’re heart. I’m done, I’m done thinking it over...I gotta get smart.”

“Change of Heart” and “L Is For Love” are both dominated by a sense of heaviness: dark chords, ethereal vocals, deep sighs, and a bitter tone. In the first, it is unclear whether the repeated lyrics “he will never stop” is about abuse or simply incompatibility, but the song is about realizing you cannot change the person you love, even though you may have “been dreaming for so long.” The latter is encompassed by feeling defeated “when the hope is gone." The exhausting plea, “Let Me In,” is driven by an unpleasant beat and equally anxious lyrics: “Baby open up the door. I don’t make me have to beg for love. I want to be your fool, if that’s all I’m gonna be.”

“It Is Something (To Have Wept)” is inspired by a G. K. Chesterton poem titled “The Great Minimum,” and at this point, the desperation that dominated the last few tracks is replaced with acceptance and appreciation for the lessons learned. “Better Love” marks the end of the emotional journey and the desire to be content and optimistic “til better love comes.” It is also a conclusion: “This isn’t over til I say when. When. When.” It’s done.

El Perro del Mar is currently touring North America.

Written by: Abigail Chance, November 21st 2009

El Perro del Mar

admin — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 13:33:00 +0000

By El Perro del Mar

The Control Group

Listening to El Perro del Mar – a pseudonym for the Swedish singer Sarah Assbring – makes me feel like I should be a character in an early 1960s television show. The chipper, pop melodies, be-bops and sha-la-las that underscore her melancholy lyrics about life and love have earned her comparisons to the Beach Boys and girl groups from the 50s and 60s. Like those groups, she’s also a big fan of repetition, as in the song “God Knows (You Gotta Give to Get)”:

God knows
I've been taking a lot without giving back
God knows
I've been taking a lot without giving back

You gotta give to get
You gotta give to get back
You gotta give to get
You gotta give to get back
You gotta give to get
You gotta give to get back to the love

Seems boring. It’s not. And don’t all of our obsessive thoughts tend to loop through our heads in quite the same way?

Yes, you’ll find yourself bopping your head to the left and the right when you slip this CD into your player, but unlike the Shirelles’ voices that sound as if they’ve gotten a good night’s sleep and sipped plenty of chamomile tea, Assbring’s is that of a woman who has been up all night weeping and throwing back glögg. Assbring probably has a perfect voice underneath it all, but she’s just too tired and hurt to give a shit. The Shirelles give you cotton candy, Assbring gives you burnt sugar.

Written by: Margaux Laskey, January 18th 2007