At The Drive-in Lyrics

Missing Monuments

Drums sit way back in the mix, but this works as the band strives to create classic garage pop. Even in the music’s rockinest moments, the tough guitars jangle, until Julien Fried throws out a burst of distorted melodic shredding. Every song features great guitar work (for fans of Television, R.E.M., Lemonheads) that often switches from simple chords to unique interplay, plus attention-getting rock solos, all of it turned up extra loud.

In front of all of that are Louie’s vocals. For what his voice sometimes lacks, he makes up for here in conviction and an ability to layer his and his bandmates’ voices in casually expert harmony. Louie’s self-harmonized vocals on the song “Painted White” will surprise those used to his one-man-band, which can at times sound like Cookie Monster being beaten to death with a high-hat. All this to say: the vocals here are very strong.

“Girl of the Night” (which seems to feature a high-voiced singer, not Louie), though well constructed and possessing some of the record’s strongest hooks, feels a little cloying. In its attempt to be classic, the song (and maybe one or two others) leans toward a ’50s soda-shop retro rock. “She’ll start to sway / when the band starts to play / that song she’s been requesting on the radio all day.” The idea of someone sitting by the radio all day to have a request honored when they could just go look it up on Pandora is a little corny. In “Dance All Night,” Louie goes so far as to reference “the hand-jive” and other dead dance crazes.

In the Springsteen-esque “(It’s Like) XTC,” the narrator makes clever love/drug puns while he and his main squeeze drive in the car listening to their favorite song, again, on the radio (In whatever world it is the band is trying to recreate, the radio is good and doesn’t play Lil Wayne over and over). For the rest of the song, Louie’s lyrics rise to a level of tight pop poetic cleverness that’s maintained throughout the record. “Victory Lap” includes the well-crafted line, “I know you hate my guitar / but if you break it, it’s not just my car / that would hurt much worse than just having to walk home too far.”

“All Bandaged Up,” tells, in part, the story of a loser cashing a paycheck after a physical accident. “Nite Fall” is a waltzing country prom tune with Louie playing the wild, storytelling preacher. It too suffers a bit from the soda-shop vibe but the song is more saved by poignant, funny lyrics about a flood (“I saw a staircase swimming for its life”). “Hot Class” bolts off the starting line with a Chuck Berry guitar break and boogie-woogie groove before becoming a sort of Misfits song: “Raging through the night, gonna get destroyed, drinking from your skull! / Cajun blood and booze, bodies makes the summer crash!” Lyrics almost always worth paying attention to.

Narragansett Beer « Band Of The Week: Young The Giant

Young the Giant write the sort of soaring, melodic rock ‘n’ roll that’s bound for greatness. From the jolting percussion and anthemic chorus of “My Body” to the lovesick fervor of “Cough Syrup” to the uptempo, sun-stained pop of “I Got,” the California five-piece’s stunning debut features an arresting collection of songs that announce the presence of a vital new band. “Islands” marries off-kilter jazz rhythms with vocalist Sameer Gadhia’s haunting falsetto to create an unnerving effect; the electric slide guitar that punctuates “Street Walker” shrouds the song’s dance beats in mystery; and it’s impossible to interpret the wall of chiming guitars in “Twelve Fingers” as anything less than pure joy. Young the Giant play big songs with big ideas, and they’re not shy about it. Consider the chorus of “Guns Out,” where Gadhia sings pointed, disconsolate lyrics over a devastating crescendo of noise: “You’ll drive in my car/ just tell me we are going somewhere/ where the stars meet the sky/ And all these people with small dreams / are looking up at the big screen/ Well, am I wrong or am I right?”

Possessing a well-honed song craft that usually belongs to far more seasoned musicians, the band’s members only range in age from 20 to 22. Comprised of Gadhia, Jacob Tilley (guitar), Eric Cannata (guitar/vocals), Payam Doostzadeh (bass) and Francois Comtois (drums/vocals), Young the Giant present a diverse set of musical ideas, one that’s as varied as their ethnic backgrounds—Indian, Persian, British and French-Canadian among them. But they share a sophisticated sensibility and they’re all natives of Orange County. If they sound polished, it’s because they’ve been playing music together since high school. “We all started writing music when we were really young,” says Gadhia. “I thought it was interesting to play in random dive bars around Orange County when I was 16. Being that age and seeing how music worked was interesting. Everyone embraced each other. It was a big community of friends.”

Although they developed their skills at shows around Irvine and Newport Beach, it wasn’t until Gadhia and Tilley started college that the band began to turn into something more than a hobby. “Jacob and Sameer would come down from college in Northern California and we’d try new material at shows,” Comtois says. “That’s how we’d gauge the songs we were working on—the response from the audiences.” The overwhelmingly positive response convinced them that they should pursue music full-time. The band recorded the Shake My Hand EP, a seven-song collection that includes a version of “Cough Syrup,” which became a favorite on KROQ. On the strength of their newfound following, the band embarked on a 2009 tour and caught the attention of Roadrunner Records. After opening up for the Whigs and Kings of Leon at Chicago’s House of Blues and making a pit stop at South by Southwest, the band signed with Roadrunner in August 2009.

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CMJ New Music Monthly

CMJ New Music Monthly

At the Drive-in Albums, This Station Is Non-Operational, Relationship of Command, in Casino Out, Acrobatic Tenement, Sunshine at the Drive-in

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