by
Matthew Smolak
In this review:
The Floor
Doll EP (March 2003)
With only seven songs and clocking
in just over 24 minutes, the Doll EP, the debut independent
release from The Floor, leaves you satisfied but unfulfilled.
Not that this release isn’t any good. It’s precisely
because it is so good that you are left wanting more.
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::
Doll EP :: |
Based in Edmonton, Alberta, Matt Pahl (singer and guitarist),
Dan Carlyle (drummer), Paul Arnusch (bassist) and Graham Lessard
(guitarist and keyboardist) have crafted pop songs with an
edge that comes not from just turning up the distortion. Instead,
they reach into the fringe memories of the Cold War and pull
out the anxiety and uneasiness of the times—from Reagan
v. Brezhnev to Joy Division and New Order.
What results is something that sounds at once familiar and
new. With a more modern sound—there are keyboards but
they stay in the background—The Floor avoids being just
another band regurgitating retro sounds. Still, you can’t
help but hear similarities to some of the best bands of the
early 1980s, whether the influences are intentional or not.
The tone is reserved and sombre, tense and angry without
being pretentious or melodramatic. The opening track, “Catastrophe”
is one of the most solid and identifiable songs on the album,
along with the poppy but ominous “Warning Signs.”
The title track is a lumbering tune, which, despite its slow
pace, keeps the listener slightly off balance due mostly to
the bass line, drums, feedback and assorted background sounds.
Unlike most popular contemporary music, the song ignores common
dynamics and construction: it never really peaks and ultimately
stumbles to a close with scratchy guitar harmonics. The blending
of distant but familiar sounds in unconventional ways, without
being novel, is one reason the album is so much more refreshing
than mainstream pop music. The album isn’t easily predictable,
but it isn’t difficult or distant either.
Despite similarities to and influences from previous musical
styles whose time have come and gone, The Floor’s Doll
EP is vibrant and fresh, unlike most new releases on
commercial radio today and even many releases on independent
radio. Regardless of when or where this album is played, it’s
a unique effort that demands to be cranked up.
Read a review of The Floor's follow-up album, Autonomy
Off/On.
More on The Floor: http://www.thefloor.ca/
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Matthew Smolak is a musician, DJ and politician
living in Edmonton, Alberta. He believes no man with a good
car needs worry 'bout nothin'. Listen to Matt live via Webcast
on Sundays between 9 and 10 a.m. MST as he preaches to the
savage mind and spins eclectic mixes. www.cjsr.com
Thoughts on The Floor or music?
Write us.
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