Unwed Teenage Mothers on Hiss Lab Recordings

John Barret from Bass Drum of Death found an incredible touring drummer when he teamed up with Colin Sneed the time I caught them at Piano's a few years back. It's really been no surprise that he would go on to record his own stuff as Unwed Teenage Mothers. Reminds me of another drummer from a little band, The Traditional Fools. Maybe there's something to Ty and Colin both having that rhythmic foundation as a starting place. Lay down the booming thud and the rest will follow.

"Forever Until You Are Bones" lays down an impressive scuzzy bassline and stomp kick beat, going to the next level when an electric roars in, dirty like that first Wavves album. Unwed Teenage Mothers have a frantic, catchy, blown away surf punk with oooooo's from the choir while that blast beat stomps away. Colin's got a monolith metronome backing this static haze in a rising tide of surf. Shares a similar spazz as the Famines or minimal punk bathed in sunshine, some kind of optimism - even if he's singing about getting the fuck out of the party. This echo is crossing oceans at supersonic speed to hit that beach matching the high velocity beat. Hardly a note played on that guitar until the chorus kicks in again, not to mention this bass line that cruises. "Blood" has the best slippery haze vocal over an acoustic this time with precision drums all blown up and hissy like an 808 high hat. This is Bare Wires, Warm soda stuff, Unwed is concise and to the point chock full of dense melody, more than a mouthful. Quick bursts of songs that has my number, making them shine under this amber of texture, tambourines and all, Thee Oh Sees, Adam Widener, these guys would all be friends, OBN III's, I'm drooling already and I haven't even gotten to the B-Side.

B-Side's "Wish you were Older" has a bashing perfection again playing with these garage tones. They get away with this being so bubblegum at the same time, to the point of Hunx, but keeping this tempo in a god damn sling, they won't let loose. It's a firm, tight track about underage girls? Yikes, they have that Matthew Mcconaughey way about his stuff, they casually get away with putting it out there. The way Matthew Melton stands by the back of his car, window broken out but doesn't seem to be having a bad day. "Are You Tired of Waking up Alone?" pushes this tempo they've been flirting with to the limits, the melody is almost getting lost in the rapid snare bursts and chord changes furiously drowning out that disarming pop charm. The solo's scream in, how could they keep up this pace for an entire show. It's the most damaged dance '50s pop that would have made any parent insane. They've done it again with another fantastic single, get to work on a full length already. I don't say this often but ENOUGH WITH THE SINGLES!

Get this from Hiss Lab Recordings.

The Unwed Teenage Mothers on Speakertree Records

I've been emailing back and forth with Blair from Speakertree Records the past few weeks, he put out that great Cloud Nothings full length a while ago, on sky blue marbly vinyl I might add...the one that started it all. The second I heard a track somewhere on someone's blog...or maybe it was a single, I had to track down the label and hear more of the bedroom multilayered recordings of Dylan Baldi. I love Turning On, I like his recent stuff as well, but for me it's always amazing to hear the very first effort of someone like this, what can be done with next to nothing, no audience yet even...I guess it's about that perfect moment when no one else is even involved...it's completely pure in some inexplicable way.
The reason I'm even talking about Dylan is that this single from The Unwed Teenage Mothers sounds a lot like those collaged, cut and paste pop songs on that album, with a glam/garage focused twists and turns. Colin Sneed is the bass drum (and snare, etc) in the Bass Drum of Death along with three other gentlemen and this sounds a lot like Colin endlessly messing around, Adam Widener style at all hours.

"If You Think Your Lonely Now" hit me with all the home craftiness that Turning On did, because this is obviously a label completely after my heart and every last spareable dollar. The track is completely optimistic, with a far off, under a matress vocal and insane attention to these hooks, they're completely deliberated, hours of spontaneous chord contemplations. It's all here...the choppy boosted low end and the room tone of all kinds of spaces, direct line in guitars, and empty concrete rooms...the layers all lining up in support of this heartbreaking pop song. Sad because it sounds like there's so much of the band invested in this, how they're trying to make it sound like it's not a big deal. Like those moments when Sebadoh would almost go too far, but somehow still got away with it. They make an upbeat pop sound while the content goes exactly the opposite, overcompensating almost for not meaning to blast you with so much raw sunshine. "FFI" the second one, did I mention this is a four song EP? What else would come out of this home pop? There's a real muted and echo'd vocal under the instrumentation, and again...that's what I love about this sound, it's got a sense of space, the tiny bedroom, a cavernous basement, it gives the track a weird sense of time also. You inherently feel it must have all been completed at different times, pieced together during different moods... An acoustic slowly works it's calm way out of the haze by the end and I love the callback to the foundation of this one. It was always there, you get that sense of where it came from...that bluesy beginning, and end up going glam. Sugary fun, pop tracks, intimately fawned over. Like Jeff Novak demo tracks, a huge amount of pure talent... all unfiltered, unpolished....the best kind, perfect for a seven inch.
"Why does it have to be tonight?" on the B-Side crafts a heavy phaser, wet guitar track... all these pieces are so heavily thought out, they carry that frantic, pop energy but are really skillfully thought out. There's a careful attention to detail in all the punches...like this backup singing and spazzy drums. The vocals are still super buried, giving him room to really belt this out, but weirdly it's taking me back to something like Sebadoh rather than straight garage rock. I guess I'm hearing the seriousness... it isn't a jokey, drunken mess. It feels like a huge elephant carefull stepping around the furniture, massive and incredible.
"Rain" takes the fuzz and just pounds away in this steady beat, a few layers of strum, all jammed together, getting a capella almost, a sort of JAMC with multiple thin, english layers...into Happy Monday bouncing dance places. Heavy fuzz comes back with a classic, beefy rock style, all the the pieces carefully placed into this intricate mosaic. Some english glam and so much harmony under this distortion sound. Not an strangling wall...a warm blanket.
Lot's of experimentation from guys who know their way around an instrument or two, and a hell of a catalog to draw from in their head. From Speakertree Records...who have a physical store by the way...run by the guys from Harding St Assembly Labs.