I was listening to some Voxtrot in the last couple days, and was reminded of just how stunned I was by the Mothers, Sisters, Daughters, and Wives EP when I first heard it three years ago. They managed to pack 9 or 10 perfect indie pop songs into five tracks, and I absolutely couldn’t wait for a full-length from them.
And then it arrived…and I really overstate how disappointed I was. They were clearly wary of the wave of hype that swept them up after those initial EPs and wanted to prove they were more than just a simple indie rock band. But as is often the case when bands try to break the mold and prove themselves to be more sophisticated than they’ve been given credit, they mistook pretense for quality and came up with a final product that was lifeless.
Berlin, Without Return… – Voxtrot
Have they learned their lessons? Maybe. They’ve released a few tracks this year, all of which offer something. Most recently, there is the Berlin, Without Return single. It still sounds a lot more dense and weighed down than I’d like, but in spite of that some delightful bits manage to creep out. It’s certainly got a chorus that would feel at home on one of those old EPs. And about two minutes in you get the first sense of pure freedom that we’ve heard from these boys in quite a while.
The b-side is “The Dream Lives Of Ordinary People,” which sounds eerily similar to “Mothers, Sisters, Daughters, and Wives,” though I’m not actually going to complain about too much.
They also released a track called “Trepanation Party” that eschews both the vivid indie pop of their older efforts and the dull-edged sound that made Voxtrot so depressing, exchanging them both for a synth-pop feel. It’s a decent enough track, but if they’re going to be derivative, I’d far prefer they stick to what they’ve already demonstrated a lot of talent at: writing catchy indie rock stuffed full of hooks and swooping choruses.