US Maple - Acre Thrills
(Drag City)
Chicago's strangest rock band, US Maple have made a name for themselves by
perfecting the art of deconstructing rock music.
They make songs from seemingly random (and bizarre) parts. Their broken
guitar lines, clumsy drums, and the throaty rasp
of singer Al Johnson invert every idiom of rock.
This, their fourth album, finds the band exploring territory a bit less
traveled by US Maple--some blatant straightforwardness.
Not that Mark Shippy (guitarist) and Al have gone back to the
aggressive bombast of their earlier punk band
Shorty, but instead, some of the songs on Acre Thrills have entire
sections where everything fits together in a normal way
all at the same time, while retaining its laid back scatterbrained menace.
For the most part, both the songwriting and feel of the record are smoother
and more laid back. However, the moments where the
focus is directed singularly makes the chaotic sections all the more
jarring. "Troop and Trouble" is very straight-ahead
but has the very distinct US Maple sense to it. "Conversational" on the
other hand, seems to have been recorded using
guitars with broken necks, in good old US Maple fashion.
Perhaps the
biggest accomplishment they've achieved is to trick
the listener into thinking the songs they write are straightforward in any
way at all.
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