Lesser Birds of Paradise - It Isn't the Fall EP
(Loose Thread)
The Lesser Birds of Paradise had me on the fence until the lyric, "A telescope is my only hope of getting closer to you... all you love is in the stars," finally sank in. After that, I was sold.
The Lesser Birds' music is a take on mellow, lightly-country pop, quite similar to The Sixth Great Lake and (therefore also) The Ladybug Transistor, that focuses on the glimmer of hope (as well as the absence thereof) in an otherwise sad world.
To create this morose world, The Lesser Birds build a Galaxie 500-esque aura from slow tempos and soft supple sounds, using a variety of instruments. "She's Got a Set of Wings" is a great example of this, as the band uses sampled Mellotron flute and strings to create a soft pillow of sound to lay a rumbling but unobtrusive bass guitar and a stuttering but gentle guitar rhythm. The whole tone of this song is downbeat—soft and easy but clearly depressed—and the lyrics are a perfect compliment to this, singing of an Amelie-esque pixie who decides to change how the world has encumbered her through fantasy and escapism.
"Into Pieces" is about as peppy as the Lesser Birds get, reaching about one quarter the pep of a bubblegum band like Call and Response. To compliment the great lyrics on the unobtainable, the band has a rather odd use of intrumentation, using both an optigan (take that Rob Crow) to create a bouncy melody and a theremin to create whispy ambience. The EP is filled with similarly odd instrumentation, adding everything from the common harmonica to the accordian to bowed vibes.
"'Til Next Spring" and "Quitters Waltz" are the weaker songs on this EP, however they blend in well with the rest of the EP, continuing its sad and mellow mood. "'Til Next Spring" starts off with a nice harmonica intro, but unfortunately only uses the harmonica during interludes, leaving much of the song to just a gentle, bland strum and lyrics that rhyme too much and mean too little. "Quitter's Waltz" really is in 3/4 time, however, there's not much more to say about it.
The Lesser Birds of Paradise are enjoyable. In some respects, this EP isn't as strong as the Sixth Great Lake's Up the Country, but, in the end, it still comes recommended, for more reasons than just that lyric about telescopes.
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