The Cedar Lounge Revolution

This weekend I’ll mostly be listening to… Crystal Stilts. April 18, 2009

Hey Kids! It’s the fresh old sounds of Crystal Stilts.

Look, I know this is the inevitable gripe of those entering middle age, but really… I find a lot of the time I’m listening to new bands I’m trying to work out the old influences so that I can actually listen to the music I’m trying to listen to… if you see what I mean.

And with Crystal Stilts it’s nearly a mathematical triangulation as regards their sources. You like the Mary Chain, the Velvets, Pale Saints, Joy Division, Felt? You’ll like these guys. Perhaps not a whole lot, or perhaps quite a bit.

I got the album a couple of months back. Listened to it once. Thought… ‘ho-hum’, put it aside and then yesterday started listening to it again. Properly.

A similar band out of the US last year was A Place to Bury Strangers who had that JAMC sound off pat. A little too pat as it happens for my tastes. Whereas Crystal Stilts do something a little bit different. Something a bit pastoral. Something, dare I say it, a bit psychedelic – if not indeed hippy. Now, there may be a reason for this.

Spin argued that they have a marriage between the Chillsand Ian Curtis. Perhaps. Perhaps.

Spin suggest as a ‘fun’ fact the idea that:

Crystal Stilts’ relation to New Zealand indie rock doesn’t stop at their sonic influences: The band received the blessing of Hamish Kilgour, frontman of seminal NZ noise-pop outfit the Clean, at their very first show.

That’s certainly ‘fun’.

Although, in truth, there’s a fair bit of garage in there. And an endearingly untutored keyboard sound that wafts in and out of songs, particularly towards the end of them. So that Clean comparison wouldn’t be so far out… so to speak.

Political? Well… who knows… check out the video of Departure below.

Anyhow, as ever, enough chatter…

And hey kids! It’s still a deeply deeply awful name.

Prismatic Room (natch!)

The SinKing (Live)

Departure (dig that keyboard/flute sound – Now this, this really does sound, in parts, like a crazed cross between Jethro Tull and Joy Division)