Times New Viking - Born Again Revisited

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How Lo Can You Go?
Sun Sep 27 14:38:53 2009
10
Rated 10 out of 13 [details]
 Born Again Revisited
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by Emma Gould
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reviews by this writer.
 

Times New Viking’s lo-fi alt-pop-rock might be so fuzzy it hurts, but it’s far from bereft of melody or feeling. Their sound is a layered aural assault of angry jangling guitars, duel vocals and crashing keyboard; influences, from DIY art-school indie to Pavement can be heard, barely, over the distortion. The intentionally ‘bad’ recording sounds like it’s been recorded live, too close to the speakers on an old wobbly cassette tape, underwater. This approach does add to the charm of the whole thing but it does actually hurt your ears to listen to it too loud, be warned.

“Born Again Revisited” is very melodic and hooky and there is an atmosphere of energy and fun running throughout. All the interesting stuff happens under the veil of foreground noise, hidden away in the background of each track, lovely little quirky riffs peek through on tracks like ‘No Time, No Hope’ and the wobbly ‘Half Day In Hell’. ‘Something More’ is brilliantly bouncy and catchy and reminiscent of The Thermals. The deliberately off key ‘2/11 Don’t Forget’ has a great, simple keyboard refrain and a dose of eardrum splitting feedback near the end and ‘These Days’ is sweet and dreamy.

There’s a lot to be said for T.N.V’s bare bones production approach; it’s an antidote to all those overproduced, bland, mainstream rock bands and they should be saluted for sticking to their guns. It’s a short album, but sweet (15 tracks but just over 30 minutes), fun and tuneful but if distorted fuzz is not your thing (and you don’t like to have your ears ringing after listening to an album) it may be an acquired taste, on the other hand, if you’re a fan of The Thermals, No Age, Lovvers and Wavves then you should definitely check this out.


Track Listing
01 - Martin Luther King Day
02 - I Smell Bubblegum
03 - City On Drugs
04 - Born Again Revisited
05 - Little World
06 - No Time, No Hope
07 - Half Day In Hell
08 - Something Moore
09 - 2/11 Don't Forget
10 - Those Days
11 - (no) Sympathy
12 - High Holidays
13 - Hustler, Psycho, Son
14 - Move To California
15 - Take The Piss