Goodbye the Band - What We Were On To
(Bang Nothing)
Some circles in modern criticism have come to the decision that the author's opinion of one of his own works is no more important than anyone else's opinion, it is merely one of many. This is probably a load of ballyhoo though. I mean, when the meaning of a work is in question, when it is ambiguous, the author's voice may give shape to the work. As long as the author's ideas do not impinge on any one else's, as long as they are merely things to take into account, to help discover facets of a work, they can be important devices for interpreting art, and not simply just "another opinion."
Case in point, Johnny American, the sole member of Goodbye the Band, writes this about his newest work What We Were On To, "I don't know what to say about the disc... mainly because a good number of songs are either completely instrumental, partially instrumental, or have lyrics which are completely devoid of substance outside the context of the music. The concept of the album is rooted more in what the songs sound like, how they're structured..., and what the sound of the album is as a whole."
While he claims to not know what to say about the disc, he does a good job of summarizing the main points and doing so in an honest manner. Somewhere between Devo, They Might Be Giants, and The Microphones, What We Were On To stakes out ground for itself that is reminiscent of all three of these bands, yet never really copies them; the air about the album simply recalls the playfulness of the first two and the cohesiveness of a Microphone's album and Elvrum's use of non-traditional song structures. Definitely a pleasurable album to listen to and I highly recommend checking it out.
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