KingBanana.net

The Sound Of Animals Fighting
• The Ocean And The Sun
• Epitaph

I get so giddy when a new TSOAF album drops. My excitement for their releases gives me this rush of pretentiousness like maybe i should attend an art opening out on Alberta st. or Ne Mississippi. This Member Swapping indie and post punk super group has a distinct way in making their listeners feel entitled to some self worth. TSOAF make me want to grab a box of wine, go down to sushi takahashi, find a copy of vice magazine, and wax poetic on my disinterest of Ayn Rands later works as opposed to her earlier works. But odds are that after i finish this review i will go right back to my scheduled routine of rereading a goosebumps book for the umpteen time while mawing down on some wasabi funyons and blasting Yellowcard’s “The Underdog Ep”.

When i First heard The Sounds of Animals Fighting it was the mastery of “Tiger and the Duke” that blew my mind away, It was this post punk progressive piece of work that combined the Guitar prowess of Finch and Rx Bandits with the vocals of Saosin and the newly formed Circa Survive. The songs ripped, the verses shredded, and the beats were in some of the greatest time signatures ever. It just owned me and everything i was thinking about music at that time. Then with their next Release “Lover the lord has left us” and it falls under the classification of “It Grows on you”, i hated that thing for lets say the first 100 spins, but i did eventually give in to the art aspect and started to dig it for the effort put into the originality and the musicianship.

This new album is a complete mix of the Tiger/Duke and Lover/lord. Ocean/sun Has moments of insane riffing over unique drum signatures like in the song “The Heraldic Beak Of The Manufacturer’s Medallion” which could have easily been on Tiger/Duke, while it also gives into the art aspect of finding a distant melody and stretching it to its tensile lengths like in “The Leather Lung” where reverb and delay and echo run game over single note picking eschewed leads. And Ocean/Sun seems to split itself into two states of mind, the first half of the album is more akin to Lover/Lord while the second half plays out as an annex to Tiger/Duke, There is something here for every TSOAF fan.

Overall i would say that this could be their most well rounded album offering up all sorts of audible goodies for anyone whose willing to drop the 10 bucks and put an ear to the stereo for an hour. If you like either of their last two albums then you must continue on the mystic journey of this Clandestine group of musicians who would have you test your boundaries for what you may or may not think is art.

Plus 14 year old girls love Anthony Green, HAHAHAHAHHAHA.