Jul. 16, 2008 - Issue #665: Surviving the Industry

Revue - The Famines

Most bands are so excited when they make a record that they’ll play it in any way they can for whoever will listen. I’ve listened to demos on the tiny speakers of someone’s laptop, and even listened to unfinished mixes out of someone else’s earbuds on their iPod. The Famines, however, took an entirely different approach.
 

Formed by prolific designer Raymond Biesinger, formerly of the Vertical Struts, and record nerd and future impresario Garrett Kruger, formerly of the Wolfnote, the duo has kept its sonic offerings tightly under wraps for a long time: first getting  together in late 2006 and only now playing its first show, the Famines’ just-released double seven-inches have been a long time coming. Meanwhile, local music fans have been subjected to the most maddening of hype machines with only a single mp3 available on the band’s MySpace, and an incredible array of alternate album cover designs popping up on local music websites and the band’s own homepage. These designs form the basis of a first rate book—that is, it’s not a booklet—that accompanies the two slabs of vinyl.
 

But the music is the most important thing, and for the most part the band’s decision to take its time has paid off. The A side, entitled “I Like Some of the Things you Do,” is an upbeat and riotous number, and it’s the one number of four that sounds like a mix-up between “that guy” from the Vertical Struts and “that other guy” from the Wolfnote. Whereas the other three tracks dive into sludgy and plodding depths, “I Like Some ... ” stays in familiar territory. Not sonically bad, to be sure, just less rewarding.
 

“TWA Flight 553,” for example—the B side—finds the band in a much more introspective mood, the cascading dirge of the song finally welling to a freak-out ending with Biesinger’s guitar clipping against stereo speakers and fighting the persistant click of Kruger’s drumming. The C side, “Gimme Some Numbers,” has a crumpled stop-start feel that bursts into a relentless chorus, while the D side, “Faux Wealthy”—the only number that seems to have any treble tone at all—grinds to an angry breaking point and threatens to bust out, until, in a moment of clarity, the song reverses upon itself and drastically tails off.

It’s always risky to build something up so big because you run the risk of falling flat and losing a few teeth, but the Famines deliver on every promise made, and in a big way. V 
 

The Famines

2 x 7”

Independent

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