Tunes Consumed: the Poutine Silver Platter

So I just received in the mail a promo disc from Murdery Mystery. I’d been looking forward to it for a little while now, and the time spent in its snail-mail transition only served to raise my hopes even higher after one of the singles & promo tracks from their website had me hooked. “Love Astronaut” takes me back to some of the better straight-shooting unapologetic boy-girl pop, and I’d fallen in love with the 8-bit/guitar love solo so much so that seemed it was written just for me.

I was fully prepared to go flying off-the-handle with praise and resounding applause here. Something like “the horizons of my sonic palette were fully broadened by the pop sensibilities of Murder Mystery’s Are you Ready For the Heartache Cause Here It Comes” and then you know, throw in some awesome 60s references, like “Beatles-meets-Beach-Boys-meets-today’s-The-Strokes”.

So much for that. It seems the technical prowess of the members has done a number on their spontaneity, and this whole “awesome fun” that I’ve been told so much of their live shows is nowhere to be found. One thing I can’t stand in a studio production is when the director thinks it’d be swell to whitewash it, do thirty takes until it’s “perfect” and then every ounce of humanness is removed so it’s as though robots were singing to the drum machines that are playing alongside recordings of the guy that may-or-may-not have played a guitar twenty takes back. And that’s weird because I love synths and robots.

While I’d be happy to share a live video of these guys with you, and then chock it up to poor engineering & direction (Mark Dann engineer for ‘NSync was involved? ugh) I can’t seem to find anything wholly redeeming.

I don’t seem to be the only one with these sentiments: Kate over at The Glorious Hum is a little more forgiving than I am, recommending that you spread out the dosing and not take it all in one sitting, and then Matt from YANP likens it to this. I couldn’t agree more.

You may like it for what it is, and what it is may cater to your tastes for simple and highly refined pop songs, but for the whole I’d say listen to these tracks before you make up your mind, and even then: to go see them in person where the hefty weight of the producers is all but present.

listen:
Murder Mystery - Love Astronaut
Murder Mystery - Honey Come Home

And the album is on sale, if you really want it.