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Kinski, "SpaceLaunch for Frenchie"
Kinski blew my mind the first time I saw them. They tore the roof offTerrastock 5 in Boston, unleashing a loud, blistering, and healthy mixof psych-rock and pop with a sound clean enough to hear the great songsrather than be buried in a barrage of overwhelming distortion. The bandworked together and didn't step on each others toes in some sloppy messthat other modern day psych rockers are far too guilty of.By the time I had seen them at Terrastock, Kinski was already donewith their third album, their first for Sub Pop, scheduled to bereleased in the following year. Old releases available at the merchtable and I quickly snagged up anything I could get my hands on. What Iheard from SpaceLaunch for Frenchie was a band who knew wherethey were going: marrying the loud volumes with an affinity for moresubdued melodies and vocals, but they still had some way to go to maketheir music more remarkable.
The passion that drives their fantastic albums Airs Above Your Station and this year's top ten contender Alpine Staticare all present, however the writing isn't all that impressive. Theband is very much in tune with each other, with carefully orchestratedswells and decays, but the riffs aren't memorable, they don't resonateand remain long after the songs are done. It's not boring, but thesongs are simply less distinguishable from the thousands of othermediocre rock bands who are playing at the local rock club, opening forthe national acts. It's not bad by a long shot, and I enjoy the vocaltracks on songs like "Floundering & Fluctuating," as they're veryreminiscent of Jesus and Mary Chain and early Spiritualized (beforeJason Pearce got the notion he was in some stadium-rock band). It's nota bad thing to sound like in my book.
The reissue of SpaceLaunch on Strange Attractors is a dream fornewer fans who may have missed out on the availability of the originalhomemade release. The original release is here in its entirety alongwith four songs from Kinski's four-track demo and one outtake from thealbum recording session. I actually love the outtake, "She Always MadeUs Work Like Dogs" a lot more than some of the tracks on the originalalbum so I'm confused why it didn't make it. The demo tracks, however,show a band who's even slightly sloppier than the band on the finalrecordings. The recording of Chris Martin's vocals and David Weeks'drums could use a lot of work but hey, who's band is experienced enoughto get -good- mic sounds on their first demos? More importantly thanany criticism of mine is that the songs are fun to listen to and Kinskiare a fantastic band and I'm glad to finally have a CD of this whosebooklet isn't wearing and fading quickly.
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