Broadcast - Tender Buttons
By: Tyler Watson | Category: Album Reviews | 10/18/05 | 09:36 PM
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Grade: B | Genre: Experimental
Summary: Wanna get haunted? Tender Buttons feels like Jefferson Airplane is back with a vengeance.
Are you familiar with the song "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane? It's the one that Dr. Gonzo is listening to in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas when he's on acid and soaking in the bathtub. He orders Raoul Duke to throw the radio into the bath tub and electrocute him when the song reaches the climax and Grace Slick is going crazy. Every song on Tender Buttons sounds like that song. There are no disturbing drug references or corrupted allusions to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, and the songs don't make me want to die from electrocution in a bathtub in Vegas, but Broadcast has done an amazing job taking the construction of that song and the feel of it and applying it to this album. Take that as you will. |
I really like "White Rabbit" and Jefferson Airplane, so it kind of feels like a continuation of something that started and ended too quickly. Now don't be thinking that just because the two are so similar that means that Broadcast is a rip-off of Jefferson Airplane. They have the same feel, which is harder to attain than the same sound. Vocalist Trish Keenan's voice sounds sort of like Grace Slick and sort of like the singer from Midnight Movies and sort of like Nico. There are even times that she sounds like Feist. Now, I hate Nico and think she ruined Velvet Underground & Nico, and I'm not crazy about Midnight Movies, but Broadcast makes music where a chanteuse like that is more in place. The best way to describe Keenan's sound is "haunting". The music playing behind her is probably best described as "haunting" too ("America's Boy" has some strange wailing going on that would scare me if it was playing in a dark room), but for some reason it still comes across as a happy album, albeit a happy album with some emotional problems (just like Jefferson Airplane!). This music will weird you.
This is an album it'll probably take you a little while to get into. I don't really pay attention to the lyrics in music unless it's right in my face, but I can just tell that the lyrics on Tender Buttons are slightly disturbing. (That's just conjecture, but six dollars and my left one say I'm right). If you're like me, your only objection will be to the overwhelming presence of analog-sounding noise. I really can't think of anything to compare the keyboards they're using to. Actually, there's one song. The French rap group TTC has a song called "Dans Le Club". It's got a keyboard loop that starts the song and plays throughout. The keyboards on Tender Buttons all sound like that. Chances are that means nothing to you. If you know what I'm talking about and you like that sound and you like "haunting" voices, you need this. If you know what I'm talking about and you don't like it, fine. Go away. If you've got no clue, give it the benefit of the doubt and check this album out. It's quickly making its way up through the ranks of my iTunes and should be debuting on my Top 25 Most Played list soon. And I'm real cool, so if I dig it you know it's hot. But seriously folks, give it your ears.
Release Date: September 20, 2005
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