Audio CD review:
Les Savy Fav - Inches

Les Savy Fav - Inches

Band: Les Savy Fav Title: Inches Rating: Release Date: 2004-04-20 Media: Audio CD Tracks: 1: Meet Me in the Dollar Bin 2: Hold On to Your Genre 3: We'll Make a Lover of You 4: Fading Vibes 5: The Sweat Descends 6: Knowing How the World Works 7: Hello Halo, Goodbye Glands 8: Obsessed With The Excess 9: One Way Widow 10: Yawn. Yawn, Yawn 11: No Sleeves 12: Reprobates Resume 13: Reformat (Live) 14: Reformat (Dramatic Reading) 15: Bringing Us Down 16: Our Coastal Hymn 17: Blackouts on Thursday 18: Rodeo

Unconventional, varied noise-rock It is a compilation of Les Savy Fav's various 7" LPs. I was introduced to this album during late November of '07. As such, each of the tracks sound wildly different from one another, and there is a progression of their sound here. As many have said, first-time listeners may have trouble wrapping their mind around it. The reason is that Les Savy Fav eschew conventional rock form in favor of unique vocals, furious riffs of justice, and a little dash of self-indulgence thrown in. Most conventional rock songs follow a predictable pattern of verses, followed by chorus, followed by more verses, etc. The main verses may have different lyrical content, but are sung the exact same way. Think Nirvana's 'Come As You Are' as a good example of this. The reason I explain is that Les Savy Fav, as a general rule, seem to throw this out of the window completely. For example, on "Reprobates Resume", the catchy chorus of 'please go easy on me' doesn't kick in until the last minute of the song, where it ends the track. Other times, the chorus starts off the song, such as in 'Meet Me at the Dollar Bin'. Many songs change tempo, or take a different direction midway through the song. Les Savy Fav's frontman is a great lyricist, offering up inventive, fresh lyrics. He also has a penchant for self-indulgence. Some of the tracks, notably 'Hello Halo, Goodbye Glands', 'Knowing How The World Works', 'The Sweat Descends', have long, repeated stretches of the same riffs, or seem to have an ending that goes on for far too long. They still make it work on those tracks, though, and it gives them a stylistic flair that's makes you wonder what's going to happen next. The guitar-work and drum-work are the real stars here. These riffs are so addictive you won't be able to help moving your arms and fingers into position and imitating with your best rock face. They're that good. They pound when they need to, and hypnotize when they don't. This album is good enough to make me want to check out their other albums. If you're a fan of alt rock, noise rock, etc. then you would do well to give this album AT LEAST 3 listens. DVD Included awesome-ness. Good tunes, and a DVD! Haven't watched it yet, but dam!. Mmmmmmm.... Tim Harrington can sure turn a phrase. Yes, this is what I've been waiting for: intelligent, slightly abstract, "punk" influenced, barn-burning, jaw-dropping rock and roll. The DVD is more comical than essential, but the CD is transcendental. . yes, give it time to digest... now, punk muzik is not what i traditionally listen to, but LSF have that borderline pop sensibility. i have to admit the only thing i'd heard from LSF before purchasing this album was the song "in these woods," mighty fine tune by the way. yes, they did jump on the 80's bandwagon, but it is their earlier work that is far superior. at first i thought the singer's voice would get annoying after a while, but the grooves on this compilation are so infectious that i got sucked in and i could never take this cd out of the stereo even when i tried to. . Give it a second try, or a third. However, you may not think so at first. This album is great; I'll just start off by saying that. For those of you who like to listen to everything, this band might come off as a bit random or "weird" at first listen, but I promise, it'll become more and more familiar every time you listen to it. It's almost like the brain isn't ready for it the first few times, but it adapts and begins to understand its subtle elegances. I started out just liking a song or two, but recently I've come to love all of them. I hope you can give this band a chance, it'll be well worth it. . You can see a complete list of all Les Savy Fav discography, or go back to the Les Savy Fav tabs