Field Music- Field Music (Measure)

“Too much of a good thing” has taken on a different connotation in the age of digital music, since you can line up the entire discography of a band and listen straight through without having to lift a finger once you click 'play.' On one hand, our attention span and willingness to listen to an album as a singular work has decreased greatly: it's too tempting to cherrypick your favorite songs and make your own playlist or mix CD. On the other hand, it's become easier than ever to listen to music at any time, so giving a new release your proper attention and patience is more likely to happen. Similarly, it's easier to listen to a band's output as one long block, or to skip around for comparing and contrasting. Thus, bands releasing long albums is a different matter now, since if they're listened to in the context of the rest of the band's discography, it all becomes one long mass of music and not so discrete and self contained.

Why do I bring all of this up? Well, it's something I've been thinking a lot about while listening to and writing reviews of Joanna Newsom's Have One On Me and Field Music's Field Music (Measure). Both are long releases, with the former being a triple album and the latter a double. The huge difference is that Joanna Newsom's release suffers from inconsistency and monotonous-ness while Field Music's problem is that it's too much of a good thing. Perhaps most listeners won't see that as a problem, but I do. At least in this case.

2007's Tones Of Town was a tight and focused album, heavily influenced by 60s pop/rock. Tracks like 'A House Is Not A Home' and 'Working To Work' contained hooks that creep up in your subconscious mind at random times, causing you to hum and tap a hard surface while waiting somewhere for something or someone, or to stumble over the lyrics while singing in the shower. Field Music (Measure), then, is the band's double album heavily indebted to 70s music, specifically AOR classic rock. The songs are much more guitar led and often feature crunchy riffs and licks, totally making the listener forget that the band is led by Scottish brothers who look more like impossibly skinny coffee shop baristas than rock stars. 'Each Time Is A New Time' has a grooving guitar and drums interplay that seems more akin to a White Stripes cover of a 70s staple than anything else. Also, the funky, lurching 'Let's Write A Book' kind of reminds me of David Bowie taking a detour in the land of the Fiery Furnaces circa Widow City, their take on 70s music.

That said, the album's second half (or second disc, if you prefer) goes more toward the arty side of 70s music. 'Curves Of The Needle' is a mini-prog rock experiment, alternating near silent piano balladry with restrained full band bursts. 'Precious Plans' sounds like a calm, pastoral interlude on a double album by, say, The Who or Pink Floyd, complete with string section. Speaking of Floyd, their shadow is cast on 'Something Familiar', most evidently at the 2:00 mark, which even has a loping piano line and extended guitar solo (I guess you'd call it a solo) that has David Gilmour written all over it. Album closer 'It's About Time' is the most arty track of all, however, since it starts off sounding like a typically great lead in to a Field Music song but unfortunately then spends most of its 9+ minute length in tedious musique concrete punctuated by string section stabs from time to time and eventually complete silence...and then goes back to musique concrete. It's an unfulfilling and questionable ending to an otherwise consistently enjoyable album, and makes The Beatles's 'Revolution #9' seem like a work of engaging songwriting.

But there's still that matter of “too much of a good thing.” For most listeners, the reason they might like this one less than Tones Of Town will be due more to the shift in sound from taut, memorable 60s style pop/rock tunes to 70s classic rock swagger and arty AOR. For me, though, it's more about the digestibility of a double album, though I do also prefer the poppier style of Tones. Yes, you could argue that most bands can feel like too much of a good thing when you listen to all their albums from end to end, but there's some other X element beyond the stylistic change and too-much-of-a-good-thing-ness that makes me enjoy Field Music (Measure) less than I probably should. It's something about the songs themselves and the way they're played and orchestrated. The arrangements and playing are deceptively complex while sounding uncluttered and simple, so the songs are melodious and enjoyable but not as outright catchy and addictive as Tones Of Town. But even then, I'm not sure that's the X element I feel when I listen to it...But I digress.

Listened to in the context of the rest of their releases in one long block, Field Music (Measure) is a perfectly fine and consistently excellent release. But taken on its own, it's an exhausting listen that leaves me restless a bit of the way into the second half (or second disc, if you prefer). Whatever that X element is that I can't put my finger on doesn't really matter, I suppose, since sometimes you just don't like something as much as you want to. It's how I still feel about Alien 3 after half a dozen viewings over almost as many years.

4 Poorly Drawn Stars Out Of 5

Field Music- Tones of Town

Well, this review is going to start off awfully digressive. You see, I'm finally back from a combination vacation/writing hiatus, and while it seems like just yesterday that I was reading year end lists (and writing some of my own), new things are already starting to come out. What's more, I started a second job today, so not only is it a new year, my life schedule is all wonky. As it stands, I'll have to work my way up to my old rate and quality. Maybe. Anyway, January...:everyone thinks of January as a time of new beginnings; we don't really associate it with much in the way of the arts. Most videogames are released in the Fall to coincide with the shop-happy holidays, movies saturate the Summer with, er, summer blockbusters and save the arsty/prestige movies for Fall or Winter. Music seems to stand alone as the venue where bands release music at their whim and not the dictates of their record company to make money or win awards. As I've been trying to seriously keep up with music for awhile now, every year there seems to be one or two albums that are released this month, surprising anyone who's still busy trying to catch up on the previous year or not expecting anything truly great yet. I like to refer to these situations as the 'January Surprise.' 2007 seemed to have a very strong start. I could probably think of more examples, but January 2007 saw a decent amount of albums I would consider to be great, including Deerhoof's Friend Opportunity, Of Montreal's Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?, Menomena's Friend and Foe, and The Shins's Wincing The Night Away. Most if not all of those came out on the same day; ah, synchronicity, my old friend. January 2007 also gave us Tones of Town by Field Music, which is one of the most criminally unsung and unknown indie pop albums this side of everything Beat Happening ever released.

I can't fathom why it is that bands like this don't get the popular audience they richly deserve. I suppose the mass audience for this type of music has long since gone. They're content to stick to R&B, hip hop, and whatever garbage strand of hard rock is on the radio today. Not that there's anything wrong with that. As for indie rock/twee pop/underground/experimental/whatever music nerds like me, we'll happily eat this stuff up. Besides, there's something awfully paradoxical inherent to indie pop now, and really there always has been. It's pop music but it's not popular music. It's pop in the sense that it's reminiscent of pop music from the 60s and 70s. So using 'pop' as a term to denote anything other than 'popular' music is technically false. But it's easy shorthand for 'music that is reminiscent of pop music from the 60s and 70s' and I'm all about that kind of succinct shorthard. My reviews are longwinded enough as it is.

Field Music are yet another reason to be a happy indie pop fan during this decade. The 90s weren't awful for indie pop music, but other than Belle & Sebastian I can't think of any really fantastic indie pop bands from that decade. Perhaps that's just my ignorance talking, though. Or maybe I'm just a reductionist dilettante. I think I will be, and right now I'll trace back the beginning of the blooming of indie pop during this decade to the release of Oh, Inverted World by the Shins in 2001 along with the trickledown effect of Belle & Sebastian. Still, I'm not sure there's any unifying aesthetic to bands like the Shins, Los Campesinos!, Field Music, The Decemberists, I'm From Barcelona, Jens Lekman, and Vampire Weekend other than the fact that you can claim they're indie pop and no one throws too much of a fit. To the average listener they may sound alike, but saying Vampire Weekend are the same as Field Music is like saying Miller High Life is the same as Guiness. Both fine beers, by the way.

Tones of Town was met with much critical acclaim on its release but was subsequently swallowed in the ensuing 11-tidal-wave-like months of music of 2007, including juggernauts like Radiohead, Arcade Fire, and uhhh Stars of the Lid. Anyway, Tones of Town is really, really damn good, and like those bands above it's all because of one thing: the music is catchy but it never gets annoying. 'Inventive' is one of those words that comes to mind when you discuss great indie pop not because these bands are changing the world but because they're putting unique spins on a seemingly set-in-stone musical form. Witness the opening track of this album, which has a chugging Paul McCartney-esque pop feel and then collapses into a vibraphone led cooldown that makes one wonder what Tortoise would've sounded like if they had grown up listening to Steely Dan and Elvis Costello. Or something like that. 'Sit Tight' has a whip tight drum groove, all staccato punctuations doing battle with sweet guitars, retro organ, melodic bass, and even a jaunty piano solo. The title track has a dreamy, psychedelic sugar glaze all over it, as if you spent 30 seconds listening to that packet of jam at Bob Evans instead of eating it, before going off on a few tangents while possessing that rare ability to sound far more simple and straightforward than it really is. 'A House Is Not A Home' namechecks the title of that classic Love song 'A House Is Not A Motel' and has a piano and string led progression with unexpected twists and turns that reminds one of, well, the Beatles. And that's just the first four songs, too. I hesitate to use the phrase "every song is a highlight" because even I always roll my eyes when I see it in reviews, but it is absolutely true here. Assuming you still rolled your eyes, have this: Tones of Town is the kind of deliriously fun, immediately engaging, endlessly listenable and enjoyable pop album that you remember in your head as having way more handclaps than it really does.

You have to give this record a chance. I know that on paper it sounds like a lot you've heard before. It uses the exact same elements that indie pop bands have since they grew up listening to the Beatles--strings, lots of piano, more hooks than a boxing match (sorry)--but it uses them so well that they seem fresh all over again. If you've ever complained that the kind of music the indie rock world loves is overrated experimental crap, then Field Music is here to remind you that we like a sweet dose of pop, too.