21 Jan 09
Circlesquare
(Wiki) | (Last.FM) | (Myspace)
Songs About Dancing And Drugs
[February 17, 2009] | [!K7]
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6.0/10
The new album from Circlesquare, aka Jeremy Shaws, has a sticky substance to it. Something about Shaws’ low-tempo steady beats are mesmerizing, but when the album is fully swallowed, like the kid eating the glue found out, it’s rather unsettling. Songs About Dancing and Drugs and Drugs is a low-profiled album that tries to eat away at your soul. It’s rather cold, and keeps its distance only presenting us with elongated musical beats as Shaws periodically chimes in to give us a few sobering lines.
Quite fittingly, the album starts off at a high point with Jeremy Shaws’ singing “This is it/This is us/Here we go.” However within this track, we’ve already seen the signs: he doesn’t know where to go next, and as a result continues with what he’s already got. The first half of the album is continued in this manner of slow, steady, dragged-on beats.
You can’t fault Jeremy Shaws for what he’s attempting to do here. Many minimalist albums have turned out remarkable – just take a look at The Field’s, albeit techno, From Here We Go Sublime. The problem is that the beats don’t have enough substance to them, and he continues to retread familiar territory again and again in hopes of finding his musical Valhalla. Nevertheless, in a few tracks he does succeed. “Music for Satellites” throws us into a state of emotional vacancy as waves of electrical ambience crash over slow acoustic strumming asking us, “And Have you ever laid down/in the back of a pickup truck/in your hometown/driving away looking up?” “Ten to One”, Songs About Dancing’s strongest track, follows and brings the tempo up as though to suggest an emotional overcoming from past distresses.
The last song, “All Live but the Ending”, is an extensive piece coming in at thirteen minutes, but accomplishes the musical direction Songs About Dancing was going for. As soon as the hook comes in at three minutes, it’s hard to pull yourself away as Shaw repeatedly sings with soft echoing, “Did ya feel it in ya / Are the drugs all gone / Are you feeling half as bad / With your high beams on” It’s his most honest track as he finds his high point and sticks to it.
Many times throughout the album, Songs About Dancing sounds as though it has hit a musical dead end and as a result drops back down to familiar low-tempo beats. For an album that takes the sobering route, it simply isn’t believable – rather an attempt to veil bland music by coming off as emotionally striking. Furthermore, the tracks are dragged out that accomplish one of two things: boredom or loss of attention. In some ways, you can look at the album as an upbeat ambient album – throw it in the background and forget about it. Overall, Jeremy Shaws has found himself capable of making solid music, but music that likes to calmly ride over flat tundra, and like grandma and grandpa on a Sunday drive, it’s nice but uneventful.
-Mark
