WRITINGS AND DISCOURSE
The written word can be just as effective as music in affecting/influencing moods and thought. Like anything that alters our preception, we often take ingest it electively, seeking its effects and craving for more. Here are some reviews of "Light Will Remain" and our first album "Eleven Theatres." Enjoy.
Speed Glue & Music review of Light Will Remain 7/2009:
"My co-writer here at Speed, Glue and Music tells me that there are people in San Francisco that actually read this blog!! Is this true? Feel free to leave some comments or share your blogs with us! Anyway since San Francisco is showing us some love, I thought I would review a SF an Oakland band that as far as I know hasn't really received much exposure yet (I could surf the internet to verify whether or not this is true, but I'm lazy). This is a band that Mr. Destroy the Scene and I randomly saw 3-4 years ago, by accident. We had left our luxurious apartment at the intersection of Mission and Precita and ducked into El Rio for a few drinks, and this band was playing. And we were blown away! Never before had I accidentally ended up watching a band I liked so much. And then... I didn't hear anything about them for years. Not, in fact, until I was board-operating an interview with Dub Trio at KUSF, and they mentioned that Atomic Bomb Audition were opening for them at the Hemlock. Did I know anything about this band, they inquired? Yeah! I said, suddenly remembering the band I unintentionally saw years back. What do they sound like, the dude from Dub Trio asked. "They sound like umm.... really heavy.... you know but also, like.... textured.... sort of shoegazey but also..... heavy" I said, and the dude from Dub Trio nodded solemnly, secretly amazed and envious at the breadth of my knowledge of music and the more technical terms pertaining to it. Anyway, I wasn't able to go to that show, and then next I heard of them is when I came across this album, Light Will Remain. Apparently this is their second album, and I'm curious to hear what their first album sounds like, because by this release they already have a very full and well-developed sound. Much like contemporary Deftones (yeah I said Deftones), Atomic Bomb Audition incorporate a lot of 90's indie, shoegaze and emo into their sound, but much, much louder and heavier. Except the Deftones ended up in their heavy-shoegaze incarnation coming from nu-metal, whereas this band seems much more natural in their melodic sensibilities. They also incorporate a lot of post-rock and prog into their sound, and the result is long, complex songs that alternate between lush melodies and heavy riffing (I just barfed a little as I wrote "lush melodies"). At various times, this band reminds me of Built to Spill, Dinosaur Jr (in particular the vocal melodies at the end of "Copernicus: Perigee"), Mogwai, Isis, Amesoeurs, The Angelic Process (who RULE and I will definitely write about soon) and Explosions in the Sky. Yet at no point do they sound derivative of any of those acts- they have a really interesting and unique sound, and I'm eager to see what they do next."
available online here
The Silent Ballet review of Eleven Theatres 4/19/2008: "Score: 7.5/10
I've recently come to the realization that any assiduous reader of Douglas Adams will confirm: all things are connected. Reading our review of Mike Patton's latest effort spun me into a nostalgic craze, forcing me to bask all day in the man's best musical pieces, one after the other. For the first time in several months, I found myself literally bathing in Avant-Rock music. It's in this atypical setup that I was presented with my next assignment:The Atomic Bomb Audition's Eleven Theatres. Happy coincidence? Nay, merely the proof that any event is part of a gigantic network of causes and consequences.
Outside of jazz, and even within it in the opinion of a few severe minds, the word "fusion," when related to music, is tainted with a negative mark. For that reason, I won't use it to describe the fantastic genre-blending ABA fashions. The magnitude of the crossover here is nothing short of overwhelming, and goes even further than what the famed acts of the genre: along with the usual taste of metal, hardcore, psychedelica, post-rocky atmospheres and various sampling techniques, one finds here surf guitar reminiscent of Dick Dale, the feel of old spaghetti western soundtracks, tightly crafted pop structures, and even thoughtful ambient passages.
When it comes to the process of writing music, having too much freedom has historically proved to have lethal tendencies, creating incomprehension, hermetic niches, and in the worst cases, extremely bad material. This is where ABA separates itself from the never ending waves of new artists in the realm of avant-garde; they show accurate and scrupulous songwriting skills. Every single heavy riff hits home, every beat change is on point, and every dissonant note is controlled. From the engaging drum breaks to the fast-strumming guitars, each instrument flows perfectly with one another, giving a strong taste of melody and harmony to a genre that came to lack them too often.
Such synergy asks for production of epic proportions. No matter how good the musicians are together, it takes an accomplished producer to give their performance a fair result once on record. The Atomic Bomb Audition found theirs in Norman Teale, who now also participates in the band's live show. I can't emphasize this enough; the production on Eleven Theatres is close to perfection. Each instrument is prominent exactly when it needs to be, every single measure of the record is treated as a highlight, given the exact balance it asks for, in the most efficient way possible. The only reproach that could be made lies in the tracklisting, as the second half of the record seems a bit weaker than the first. And even that is being picky.
ABA achieved a work of art; all the while respecting the touch of craziness avant-garde listeners ask for. This album is one to be played loud, and constantly. What strikes me the most is the maturity they show at such an early stage in their career; I had to offer countless reminders to myself that this is their first effort. With a second album on the way that seems to match the performance of Eleven Theatres, The Atomic Bomb Audition have the skills to establish themselves as leaders of this scene if they play their cards right." - Samy Bennaoui, The Silent Ballet
available online here
SF Weekly write-up & interview 11/14/2007:
"Oakland's The Atomic Bomb Audition makes the kind of mind-numbingly loud, classically informed music that shakes the inside of your skin, and makes you check your pulse and your receiver to prevent either of these from blowing out. Formed in 2004 by Oakland Mills students Alee Karim and Brian Gleeson, their entitled "Eleven Theatres" debut on Seattle's independent label Hector Stentor toes the line between math-rock, proggy metal, Italian soundtracks, surf, waltz, and pop. But don't let the genre bending deter you; their approach to rock although owes part of its sound to the avant-rock leanings of NorCal bands like Mr. Bungle and Fantomas, this is a decided attempt to make avant-rock with a pop structure sensibility. The band is currently working on their second album and are set to rock you at 21 Grand in Oakland on Saturday, November 17th with SEAN, Hacksaw to the Throat and
Times of Desperation. For a review of the record and an inside view of the band's workings read more:
The first time I heard their demo, I knew I wanted to produce it because after all the free jazz stuff I've had to listen to at Mills, it was refreshing to hear something with an emphasis on melody and actual songwriting," says producer Norman Teale now a permanent member of the band who adds live signal processing via electronics.
Seated at a taqueria in Oakland with all four members of the band, they explain to me the genesis of the name. "Brian was messing around with the kind of cut and paste techniques that was advocated by William Burroughs where you just shuffled words around and see what you could come up with and the name The Atomic Bomb Audition stuck." "When we started the band there was this sense of the Apocalypse with everything going on in the world at the time juxtaposed with living in the Bay Area which tends to be an optimistic place that kind of represents the emotional dialectic of the band". Apocalyptic optimism, hmmm.
One thing is for certain, the first moments on "Eleven Theatres" are sure to snap anyone out of their seat who has listened to bands attempt to mix disparate genres before. The "Creationist" starts out with a death metal riff that Cannibal Corpse would be proud of, and then subtly morphs into an Angelo Badalamenti soundtrack that then decides to put you onto a merry go-round-carousel suite. After all this local fair goodness, the rhythm section then breaks downs into a psych-rock waltz chock full of funky organ while finally landing somewhere between space-metal and slow-core for an obscure Hungarian film that never existed.
Fusion, fusion, is what most critics will scream after reading this description, but this is where they are unequivocally wrong. "We are not a riff band, or a fusion band' says Alee, " Shit, I'd rather be in a Smiths cover band, than in a fusion band". We make rock music with a cinematic edge, but always with a structure in mind". According to the band, it discards any presumptions from listeners who want to put them in the "music for art school camp" "I met Brian while we were both working the box-office at Yoshi's, (the premier venue for jazz in the Bay) and the kind of self indulgent noodling that I endured over the time there was just atrocious", so I'm sensitive to that stuff, says Alee. "It was one night, that Brian got on a guitar and started playing a Melvin's riff that I said, Hey, we should do something together".
This attempt to make avant rock with a pop structure sensibility is what yields the best results on "Eleven Theatres". The formula is patently apparent on "Wave of Babies", a monster riff taken out of the math-rock cookbook which leads into a reverb drenched chorus so catchy it will make you go back to your At the Drive In and early Mars Volta records and realize why Spartan punk rock ideals mixed with the cerebral thrust of King Crimson makes sense. And also, why Mars Volta lost their way when they forgot that proggy tendencies are only good when tempered by rigor, structure, and yes, melody. Which is what makes "Eleven Theatres' a different record from the usual genre bending mash up outfits that try to mix genres without revealing the integrity of each genre as such. "We never go into recording with this set code in mind of we are going to mix bluegrass into metal, and then into jazz, go Sinatra lounge and then add a Big Lebowski sample, the stuff we do all comes out organically, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work."
So what are they like live? The operative word here is: LOUD. "Yeah we turn up the amps and Norman records our signal frequencies and then runs them back through the speakers adding layers and sonic textures, it gets pretty loud, not shrill like glass, but LOUD like the Apocalypse."
--Oscar Medina
available online here
SF Bay Guardian review of Eleven Theatres 5/12/2007:
"Noted egotist Morrissey once carped to his audience that there are too many bands these days, clogging the world's collective psychic space. While it's probably true that fledgling rock groups must annually create a mountain of plastic to rival Mount Tam, once in a while a record appears that's so engaging that all the shrink wrap seems worth it. Eleven Theatres, by Atomic Bomb Audition, is one such effort.
From the outset the band makes it clear that its technique allows for limitless possibilities. "Entropic Phenomena" is a dark collage of sympathetic piano overtones that births the murderous cacophony of "The Creationist." "Wave of Babies" charges forward on the strength of a double-bass pedal and serrated guitars that live on the frontier between Kirk Hammett and J Mascis, then retreats into a Cocteau Twins–esque daydream.
Pastoral reflection "The Apostate" is picked out on the guitarlike Bolivian charango. With seemingly boundless sonic ingenuity, Eleven Theatres unfolds as a vivid, sensuous document so full of pleasant surprises that it's not hard to imagine the Atomic Bomb Audition sharing a bill with Laurie Anderson, Tortoise, Shellac, or hell, Morrissey." - Nathan Baker
available online here
