Oh Sees Retrospective #25: Memory Of A Cut Off Head

As I near the end of this retrospective series, it seems fitting that I'd eventually get back around to talking about OCS. Now, you might argue that since I'm not covering Damaged Bug and other John Dwyer side projects, I shouldn't technically be writing about Memory Of A Cut Off Head. Yes, part of the reason he revived the OCS name is that he now considers Oh Sees and OCS to be distinct entities, though this is a bit of a sleight of hand. Early releases under the OCS name are certainly distinct in style and tone from, say, Help or Smote Reverser, but in the early-era of the band the subtle name changes slowly blurred OCS into The Ohsees and then into Thee Oh Sees and finally into Oh Sees. The lineup from the early OCS days also slowly morphed into the mid-era foursome, so even if I am cheating a bit on this one, I still think it's a relatively fair cheat. And anyway, Memory Of A Cut Off Head features contributions from Nick Murray and Tim Hellman, who were/are from the modern-era Oh Sees lineup, as well as future Oh Sees member Tomas Dolas, so there!


Like many surprise Oh Sees releases, the revival of the OCS name and announcement of an album seemed to come out of nowhere. Memory Of A Cut Off Head was released on November 17^th, 2017, mere months after Orc. Technically speaking, this record is billed as a collaboration between Dwyer and Brigid Dawson. This is interesting because she was never nearly as a big presence on old OCS records. They were dominated by Dwyer...which makes sense, since I think we all forget Dawson didn't join OCS until album five, The Cool Death Of Island Raiders, which was released as The Ohsees, not OCS. So I guess she was never really a member of OCS until 2017? Eh, maybe this is needlessly splitting hairs. Memory Of A Cut Off Head (hereafter referred to as simply Memory) is a fun throwback in terms of the OCS style. To have Patrick Mullins back is pretty huge, as is the reappearance of former Oh Sees drummer Nick Murray (who we last heard on Mutilator Defeated At Last, or the Fortress single if you want to be a stickler for details). Tim Hellman is an interesting addition to the OCS sound, since if I remember right they never really had a bassist before. John Dwyer must love him as much as I do! Tomas Dolas contributes unspecified keyboards to the album, marking this his first appearance on an Oh Sees/OCS album, though he's billed as Thomas Dolas because...I don't know. It's either laziness or whitewashing, and I'm much inclined to believe the former. Luckily this would be rectified on Smote Reverser.


Going into this retrospective series, I was most curious to tackle the early OCS output and in particular to revisit this one. I had only given a couple cursory listens to Memory before coming back to it for this series, and it's been an eye opening experience. I had almost forgotten how nice Dwyer and Dawson's vocals sound together in a more psych folk/orchestral folk setting, especially when he's singing more hushed and melodically. It's also much easier to pick out the lyrics, which are quite dark and suffused with death and sadness. For example, 'The Remote Viewer' offers the chucklefest of a chestnut: “we are junkies of despair.” Anyway, if Memory is a return to any era of the band, it's a return to the old OCS sound circa 2. However this time it's much more “professional” and full sounding, with the welcome addition of string arrangements. In fact they're essential to this record and its style. There's a very good reason the OCS Live In San Francisco has string players on it. Some of the Beatles-esque/early Pink Floyd whimsical psychedelia and orchestral folk elements I've detected on the 'solo' Oh Sees records like Castlemania and Drop are in full bloom here. There's other intriguing instrumental flourishes, such as the harpsichord on 'The Remote View' and another welcome trotting out of Dwyer's flute skills for 'On And On Corridor.'


On a side note, the overall buoyant feel and especially the Rhodes-style organ in the beginning of album closer 'Lift A Finger By The Garden Path' always makes me imagine a slower, more folky 'You're My Best Friend' by Queen. Am I the only one who hears it? Probably.


Perhaps the greatest change to the OCS sound comes in letting Brigid Dawson step forward as a true collaborator. As far as I remember, Memory is the first time she sang on an OCS/Oh Sees songs alone, and presumably she helped write at least some of the lyrics. Overall, hearing her voice alone reminds me a lot of another female singer but I can't put my finger on who for the life of me. 'Time Tuner' definitely starts off sounding like Nico. I know I also made this comparison for one of the last songs on Castlemania but 'Time Tuner' could have gone on The Marble Index and nobody would have done a double take. Anyway, this record makes me curious to hear more full-blown collaborations between Dwyer and other people. I know at some point he was rumored to be working with Ty Segall but that either didn't happen or it ended up just being Segall co-producing Orc. I'm a big fan of Segall's two collaborations with White Fence, in particular Hair, so I'm still holding out hope. But I digress. With all the changes and updates to the sound, and the addition of Oh Sees members, it's easy for me to forget the way Memory actually is a throwback in a few crucial ways. Obviously there's the mellow/downer atmosphere, as well as the prominent use of acoustic guitars and occasional singing saw contributions from Patrick Mullins. In addition, I love that the ending of 'The Baron Sleeps And Dreams' is a drone throwback to similar moments/tracks on OCS releases. One last throwback that isn't really an OCS throwback: the album cover was done by Jonny Negron, the same artist as Drop, which makes total sense because the color palette is almost exactly the same. I find his style more limited and less appealing than Ryan Beatty; as ever, your mileage will vary.

I've struggled with a way to conclude this retrospective because I have very complicated feelings about Memory. Let me start by saying it's absolutely tops as far as OCS-billed releases. It's as if it presents an alternate history wherein John Dwyer kept The Coachwhips going and so didn't steer his OCS project into going in more of a rock rather than a folk direction, becoming the Oh Sees we know in our timeline. Memory, therefore, is like if he kept putting out OCS records between Coachwhips projects, so that in this alternate timeline OCS developed/matured into this particular nuanced, orchestrated sound, while also allowing Dawson to step forward more often. Now, all of this said, though I may not have any issues and problems with Memory, I don't adore it. It works for me but it isn't something I foresee wanting to listen to consistently over the coming years. It's quite similar to how I feel about the Damaged Bug records. They get released, I listen to them and admire them and appreciate them for what they are, and I don't have many, if any, relevant complaints...yet they don't fully bewitch me. Well, that's subjective taste for ya. Next time we'll find out if OCS in a live setting makes any difference.

Oh Sees Retrospective #24: Orc

I have to be honest, when I first saw the announcement back in 2017 that the forthcoming Oh Sees record would be called Orc, I thought man, that's lazy as hell. This is a band with a series of excellent album titles—yes, I even like Drop for its varying meanings—and Orc just seemed arbitrary. Sure, Dwyer was turning up the fantasy influence in the lyrics and overall aesthetic of the band, but “Orc”? Really? Plain and simple “Orc”? Not even “Warrior Orc” or “Orcs Brew” or something? Well, perhaps this paring back of the title was a nod to the band changing their name to simply Oh Sees, dropping the Thee. As it turned out, while a couple listens of Orc won't sound so different from A Weird Exits/An Odd Entrances, there's more changes going on than the surface level name change and stripped back album title indicate.


Orc was released on August 25^th, 2017, and along with the band name shortening to Oh Sees, there were a couple other crucial changes. As discussed in the last retrospective, Ryan Moutinho quit the band two days before the release of An Odd Entrances, and in early 2017 Paul Quattrone took his slot, maintaining the dual drummer setup we've all come to love. This addition would also solidify the modern-era lineup (minus Tomas Dolas, who only became an official member after Smote Reverser). By the by, for those curious, Quattrone is always in the left stereo channel and Dan Rincon is always in the right. I'm assuming they kept this convention going forward though I don't recall if the liner notes continue to specify this. The other big change is that this is the first Oh Sees album not to have Chris Woodhouse as recording engineer/producer/collaborator, after a streak stretching all the way back to Sucks Blood in 2007. I'm sad to report I wasn't able to find any information explaining why Woodhouse stopped working with Oh Sees. Judging by his Discogs credits, he hasn't been very active in the last year or two. He even left The Dock recording studio he helped found. Hopefully nothing bad happened to him, or anyway, between him and Oh Sees. Anyway, this led Orc to be a production handled by the team of John Dwyer, Eric Bauer, Ty Segall, and Enrique Tena (who is referred to in Smote Reverser track 'Enrique El Cobrador', which means “Enrique the debt collector”). It's weird, I always forget Ty Segall worked on Orc. I'd think this would be a bigger deal to people but I don't remember anyone bringing it up or commenting on it. By 2017 Ty Segall was arguably more mainstream and popular than Oh Sees, yet none of the professional music magazine/website reviews made even the smallest fuss of his involvement.


To these ears, Orc is a slightly-more-modern sequel to Mutilator Defeated At Last. It's solid all the way through, has no weak tracks, and it's an across-the-board fan favorite. It also has a reputation as a dark/heavy album akin to Floating Coffin. This isn't completely deserved, at least musically. Yes, lyrically the album is pretty dark and heavy, a strange mix of almost self-consciously poetic turns of phrase and disturbing imagery, continuing the apocalyptic scifi/fantasy concepts of the last two records. For example, opener 'The Static God' is from the point of view of a self-destructive/masochistic character, trying to bum cigarettes and wondering aloud, “I'm leaning in/into the whip/does it satisfy me?” Not to mention there's a track called 'Cadaver Dog', for god's sake! Musically, the album is quite heavy though it does have more variety than Floating Coffin, so the reputation is only partly deserved. Before I get to said variety I should touch on the heaviness, as Orc has some of the band's most crunchy riffs and metal-tinged moments. 'Animated Violence' is one of the heaviest tracks of the modern-era, rivaled only by 'Face Stabber' or 'Heartworm.' However, this heaviness is leavened expertly with slower/calmer moments and songs, like the five minute long viola-led second section of 'Keys To The Castle' and the slow dance fantasia of 'Drowned Beast.' There's also the aptly named 'Cooling Tower', which sacrifices heaviness for grooviness, and has a churning/chugging up-and-down riff that reminds me a bit of both parts of 'Unwrap The Fiend.' Also, is it just me or does the drumming on this track really sound like Can circa Ege Bamyasi? They've been a huge influence on Oh Sees for years but the grooviness and repetition of the drumming on this track is absolutely out of Jaki Liebezeit's wheelhouse, specifically 'Vitamin C.'


The main difference that sets Orc apart from the previous few releases is that the songs are more dynamic and sectional. This is part of where the increased prog rock influence comes in. Sure, the songs being a bit longer than normal, overall, accounts for this feeling as well, but only partially. 'Nite Expo' and 'Keys To The Castle' both have a rather linear development instead of the usual pop song verse/chorus/verse, while 'Raw Optics' is the kind of solid album ending instrumental that you want to write home about. It's a classic 70s prog rock/acid rock track and I absolutely adore the drum solo section. It's a much more interesting and enjoyable version of the 'Drums' improvisation sections of the second set of Grateful Dead shows. This song, more than any other, points to the jammier direction of Smote Reverser and Face Stabber. While we're on the subject of instrumentals, it's worth noting that Orc has three of them, and two of them are back-to-back in the tracklisting, with the third coming one song later. In theory this risks backloading the album with samey sounding material, but Oh Sees have mastered so many styles of music and the dynamics of instrumental songwriting/jamming that they're among the most compelling songs on Orc.


Since I'm not going to do a retrospective on it, I want to briefly mention the Dead Medic EP. At only two tracks it's difficult to call it an EP though both tracks add up to 20 minutes, so maybe this is one time I need to stop being so pedantic and listen to the artist's intent. Near as I can tell the title track is an in-studio jam, with frenetic drumming and all kinds of psychedelic splurts and burbles going off like slow motion fireworks reflected on the surface of a lake. The other track is a cover of an old school Swedish band I won't even pretend to have heard of. Reminds me a bit of what I remember Amon Düül II sounding like, though I haven't listened to them in years so I recommend finding out for yourself.


As I don't have anything negative to say about Orc, I do want to also take the time to briefly detour to mention a truly terrible and insulting review of the album on Under The Radar. They gave it a ridiculously low 2/10 score, and that's whatever; I hate scoring systems, I haven't used them for years, and that's not why I was so bothered. Moreso I'm blinded by rage with the condescending tone and jabs at nerd culture in this useless, masturbatory excuse for a review. I don't know what it is with the “professional” music press in the UK always being huge pretentious assholes in general, and especially about psychedelic and prog rock music. If you guys sometimes disagree strongly with what I write, prepare yourselves for this bullshit: http://www.undertheradarmag.com/reviews/oh_sees_orc/


OK, detours are over. Given the context of the records to follow, you can look at Orc as being the svelte and focused version of what Smote Reverser and Face Stabber mutated the sound into. By this I mean that Orc lacks most of the jammy/noodly stuff that turns some people off of the latest two albums. This isn't to say Orc is a pop record with short songs, far from it. A better explanation is that it trims all the fat and the sprawl and only leaves the best, most essential parts in these songs. Myself, I love the fat and the sprawl, too. Sometimes I want 'Nite Expo' and sometimes I want 'Henchlock', just as sometimes Oh Sees want to title an album “Orc” and not “The Master's Bedroom Is Worth Spending A Night In.” What else is there to say? You know Orc, you love Orc. Zug zug.

Oh Sees Retrospective #23: An Odd Entrances

In the late 90s, if you'll pardon the cliché, it was the best of time and the worst of times to be a Radiohead fan. The best, because the Internet brought together us fans who obsessed over every obscure single, EP, and recording update on the band's official website. The worst, because after releasing OK Computer in Summer 1997, we would have to wait until October 2000 for the next album, Kid A. As if to placate their rabid fanbase, less than a year later Radiohead released Amnesiac, a companion album to Kid A, taken from the same recording sessions (well, other than 'Life In A Glasshouse'). You may be thinking I'm about to draw parallels to A Weird Exits and An Odd Entrances, though you'd be mistaken. To me the true Radiohead parallel is OK Computer and the North American-exclusive Airbag/How Am I Driving? EP. This mini-album, as it was labelled on the cover, serves as a companion piece to OK Computer, full of excellent tracks which either didn't make the cut or didn't flow well with the rest of the album. Despite repeating the song 'Airbag' from OK Computer, it's a release that can be judged on its own merits, just as An Odd Entrances can be despite repeating...well, alright, it doesn't technically repeat any songs, but we'll get to that a bit later.


Following A Weird Exits by a mere three months, An Odd Entrances (I'll be using the same single noun shorthand from the last retrospective hereafter) came out on November 18^th, 2016. Its arrival was somewhat clouded by the announcement two days prior from drummer Ryan Moutinho that he had quit the band mid-tour. Reading the interview with him I linked in the previous retrospective, you get the sense he left in order to pursue his own projects and to step out from the role of 'the drummer' that he had consistently been roped into. Oh Sees would briefly perform, once again, as a trio before Paul Quattrone joined sometime in early 2017. Anyway, in doing research about Odd I was surprised to learn that a couple of the limited edition vinyl versions came with a 7” Flexi-disc of previously unreleased track 'Classic Bananas.' It's a fantastic song that deserves more listens and awareness. Furthermore, it's strange that it wasn't included on either Weird or Odd. If I had to hazard a guess I'd say it's because it's a bit of a throwback to the mid-era sound and the production style doesn't quite match the albums. Also, this reminds me: where the hell is Singles Collection Volume 4 already?!


Clocking in at roughly ten minutes shorter than its predecessor, Odd is a strange beast indeed. It's not quite short enough to be an EP, in my opinion. It's described as an appendix on the Bandcamp page. Then there's Spotify, who have it under 'Singles'! I'm going to go with the Airbag/How Am I Driving? EP nomenclature and refer to it as a mini-album. The closest parallel I can think of in the Oh Sees discography is actually the Moon Sick EP. Both it and Odd contain a batch of great songs (mostly slower/weirder material), they can stand on their own, and they can be taken as supplements to their parent albums. In terms of standing on its own, Odd has plenty of delights that don't require knowledge of Weird to enjoy. It starts with 'You Will Find It Here', one of, if not the best, opening songs on any Oh Sees release. Whenever I make mixes to get other people into this band, it's always my go-to opener. 'The Poem' sounds like it could be on one of the 'solo' Oh Sees records, like Drop or Castlemania. Whimsical lyrics, the guitar sound, and the overall atmosphere make me think of The Beatles circa 1967 or the first Pink Floyd album (also 1967....huh). It's perhaps worth noting that a full half of the tracks on Odd are instrumentals, something the band would continue to sprinkle on future records. I must make quick note of 'Nervous Tech (Nah John)', which is a better version of what 'The Axis' turns into toward its end. However, it's still the weakest track on Odd, relatively speaking, and it goes on too long without enough development. Liner notes indicate it's “derived from 'Go Ahead John' by Miles Davis” which makes a ton of sense when you listen to them back to back. John Dwyer still isn't really soloing in the way that makes the lengthy Miles Davis track slightly more compelling (though I also think that song goes on too long and isn't one of the best from the fusion era Davis releases). It's more like his improv on 'Contraption' off of Live In San Francisco, which is enjoyable in small doses but not for eight minutes straight. If I learned anything from the feedback from the last retrospective, your mileage will vary.


Perhaps more interesting to discuss is how Odd complements/contrasts with Weird. Let's focus on the sibling tracks from both releases. I recommend making a playlist and listening to them “in order”; it's a fun experiment. 'Unwrap The Fiend Pt. 1', from Odd, is pretty straightforward, other than the self-destructing keyboard ending, and establishes the Fiend riff/motif. 'Unwrap The Fiend Pt. 2' is a bit slower/groovier and the guitar has a greater variety of textures. I love the churning/chugging “chorus” part, always makes me visualize machinery moving things around a factory or a sped-up overhead shot of cars driving through a city center. 'Jammed Entrance' is ironically on Exits and has a killer bassline and noodly keyboard/synth solos while Dwyer takes a break from guitar. The drummers are really getting down on this track, it's a feast for percussion lovers. 'Jammed Exit' is equally compelling, with a more simple bassline and a mix that places more emphasis on the keyboard/synth. Can't forget to mention Dwyer's flute soloing on 'Jammed Exit', something that I often forget is there if I'm using Odd as background music while I drive or play videogames. Sure, 'Jammed Exit' is more monotonous than 'Jammed Entrance' but eh, it still works.


As with the Moon Sick and Airbag/How Am I Driving? EPs, mini-album Odd is a worthy quick follow-up to its parent album, one that can stand on its own merits and that can also serve as a companion piece. Lost until the last minute in all of the discussion of these twin releases is the fact that Odd would be the last time the band would operate under the Thee Oh Sees moniker. Starting with Orc, they'd shorten it to Oh Sees, though whether this was a way of signaling a slight change in musical direction or to reflect the new lineup with Paul Quattrone on drums, we'll have to find out next time.

Oh Sees Retrospective #22: A Weird Exits

There's a question I've been grappling with since the start of this retrospective series, something I've been putting off answering until the time came. And it's this: can you talk about A Weird Exits without also constantly talking about An Odd Entrances? In some sense this retrospective series is about examining each Oh Sees release in a sort of contradictory manner. What I mean is, I try to consider them on their own merits but also as part of the greater discography. With these twin releases, though, the waters become ever more muddied. I mean, An Odd Entrances is its own thing yet it's also leftovers that didn't work with the Weird Exits songs...yet it's not long enough to be a full album...yet it can reasonably be judged on that basis because it feels like a complete, intended experience and not like a leftovers collection. It's complicated, is what I'm saying. For whatever it's worth, I am going to try to judge the two releases on their own strengths and weaknesses and not get sidetracked by comparing 'Jammed Exit' to 'Jammed Entrance' or the two parts of 'Unwrap The Fiend.' There's enough to cover with A Weird Exits as it is, so I'll probably save most of that for the retrospective of An Odd Entrances since I won't have as much background info to go over.


Released on August 12^th, 2016, A Weird Exits is the first studio album to feature the foursome lineup with two drummers. Now, sure, Oh Sees did have two drummers on Carrion Crawler/The Dream and on a smattering of other songs over the years, but they never stuck with it as they have since 2015. A Weird Exits (hereafter simply Weird) and An Odd Entrances (hereafter simply Odd) are culled from the same batch of recordings. According to an interview with drummer Ryan Moutinho (http://www.thereprise.org/features/2017/2/22/thee-oh-sees-ryan-moutinho), it was a marathon three or four day session, after which John Dwyer finished/mixed the rest on his own. The music is more collaborative in spirit than Mutilator Defeated At Last because the band had been touring consistently for more than a year and they were jamming and coming up with song ideas on the road. Anyway, while I'm pleased that the last few releases have had no confusion when it comes to release dates and if they're an EP or not, we do have two topics to hash out before we proceed. First, what is the excuse for the lack of consistency of the title of 'Crawl Out From The Fall Out'?! It's listed as 'Crawl Out Into The Fall Out' on the vinyl record and on Wikipedia/Discogs but the Oh Sees Bandcamp and Spotify pages have it as 'Crawl Out From The Fall Out.' Now, you might be saying, it's a minor detail, who cares? Well, crawling out into something is rather different from crawling out from something. The next time you're near a burning building tell me which you'd rather be doing, if given the choice between the two. The second and more important issue: the liner notes mention something about an organ line lifted from an album which in turn lifted it from Jimi Hendrix. I did my usual diligent research and figured out it's 'The Axis.' The organ line on it is either a sample or a recreation of part of a track by Solo Organ. The part in question comes around the 8:00 mark of the second track from this album: https://soloorgan.bandcamp.com/album/atom-heart-and-beyond-the-infinite The artist's real name is Douglas Katelus though this is incorrectly spelled as Doug Catelis on the sleeve, because nobody cares about the details except me, I guess. Again, you may be saying, minor detail, who cares? Well, when it comes to crediting people for the work they did, it isn't a minor detail because it can lead to issues with songwriting credits and royalty payments. Johnathan Dryer, err I mean John Dwyer should be ashamed.


Whew OK, now that I got all of that out of my system...


Weird continues the trend started by Mutilator Defeated At Last, putting even more emphasis on psych/prog/metal and further scaling back the garage rock. Make no mistake, Weird is still heavy at times and knows when it's time to rock but the overall atmosphere is not as frenetic and manic. Compare 'I Was Denied' from Warm Slime to 'Ticklish Warrior' to get an idea of what I mean. Now, I rarely mention Oh Sees lyrics because they're usually just window dressing and are often hard to make out without looking them up online. I want to briefly touch on them for this retrospective because it was around this time in the band's discography that (lyrically) marked the start of John Dwyer's further descent into conceptual scifi/fantasy worldbuilding/story telling. It's interesting that this album has two instrumentals, thereby putting more emphasis on the words when they do appear. Anyway, 'Dead Man's Gun' and 'Unwrap The Fiend Pt. 2' are filled with stuff about nuclear war and surviving in the post-apocalypse and all kinds of crazy shit, to put it bluntly. Suddenly the video for Face Stabber track 'Poisoned Stones' seems less like it's meant to be a joke—perhaps, like the Gizzverse, Oh Sees have their own universe? Ehhhh no, let's not go there.


Some people truly love Weird and Odd and consider them a peak. They aren't quite up there for me though I do understand. Smote Reverser really set them into a slightly different direction that not everyone is down with. Though I don't outright love Weird or Odd, there is a lot to enjoy. Superficially speaking, the way the two releases play off each other with the album titles is really clever, and I think the always underrated Robert Beatty nailed it with his art for the covers. It's undeniable that Weird has some classic tracks that are live set staples, such as the meaty 'Plastic Plant' with its drum breakdown near the end, and the throttling 'Gelatinous Cube', which has one of the coolest introductions of any Oh Sees song. In fact while I'm piling up the praise, can we all take the time and appreciate Tim Hellman? He's the unsung hero of Oh Sees history—I've said before that I do love Petey Dammit! but having a dedicated bassist does wonders for the modern-era sound. I love the warm/round tone of Hellman's bass, and as a musician he has that indefinable ability to be both rock solid and groovy as hell. If you don't have access to speakers or headphones with decent bass response, you're missing out on a lot. Similarly I want to praise John Dwyer's guitar sound and playing style on Weird and Odd. I've been a big fan of psychedelic delay/echo/reverb effects since first hearing the trumpet wails during the opening of Miles Davis's 'Bitches Brew', and I think Dwyer really started to give me the goodness during the modern-era of Oh Sees. Every time I hear the beginning tune-up/jam part of 'You Will Find It Here' my third eye opens and I can see for miles. But that's on Odd and we're not talking about that yet!


The flaw of Weird that brings it down in my estimation is that it ends with 'The Axis.' I don't like anything about this song. Dwyer's vocals are so affected and hokey that they're distracting. It's a terrible choice for closing track not simply because it's bad but also that it doesn't fit in with the tone of the rest of the record. It feels like an inside joke that got out of hand, an anti-love song/breakup song with lame lyrics. It ends up being further ruined by Dwyer's redlined guitar and irritating noise. It smacks of listening to too many Dave Fridmann produced albums from the mid 2000s, all blown out and clipping and distorted and ruining what would otherwise be good albums. For example, listen to Some Loud Thunder by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! and The Woods by Sleater-Kinney. I loved the latter at the time but it hasn't held up for me, production-wise. It's the classic issue of subtraction by addition: does this production style add anything to make the songs better? I'd argue it's a distracting gimmick that only works for some specific records (Embryonic by the Flaming Lips is an example of when it works well). Anyhow, I'm all for experiments but 'The Axis' is a failure and I have no idea what Oh Sees were going for.


Let's not end on a negative, though. 'The Axis' aside, Weird is a solid entry in the Oh Sees discography. To me it's the sort of album in a band's history that is above average and certain fans will end up adoring it yet when measured against everything else it just isn't as exceptional and cohesive as the top tier. Weird is a B but it's a solid B, and there's no shame in that.

Oh Sees Retrospective #21: Live In San Francisco

Did you ever meet the kind of person who says “what's the point of going to see concerts? I have to deal with a crowd of people, pay for overpriced drinks, and often the sound sucks. Why not just stay home and listen to the albums?” What a jackass, right? Well...I used to be that person. To be fair, I had seen a couple concerts so I felt justified in my opinions. The error in my reasoning was that I hadn't been going to the right kind of concerts. I mean, if you're going to get people to come see you, the onus is on you to provide them with something beyond the album experience. You need to improvise/jam, to do medleys, to have a visual spectacle of a stage show, to mix-up setlists and play rare/older material, to rearrange songs and perform them in new ways...you get the idea. The possibilities seem limitless yet so many bands, even bands I love, stick to the standard, boring concert experience. Though I've sadly never seen them live, Phish and Animal Collective put great care into their live shows; arguably, Phish put more emphasis on their live shows than they do on their studio albums. I get the sense Oh Sees split the difference pretty damn well, if Live In San Francisco is anything to go by. While we did technically get a live album from Oh Sees well before Live In San Francisco, it almost doesn't count since, y'know, there wasn't an audience present. And anyway, this one is a more accurate representation of the live Oh Sees experience.

You know what time it is: let's run down the vitals. Live In San Francisco was released on July 1^st, 2016. It was taken from shows (July 15^th-17^th, 2015) during the tour following the release of Mutilator Defeated At Last. By this point the trio lineup had expanded and mutated; drummer Nick Murray left after the release of Mutilator, and in came Dan Rincon and Ryan Moutinho. It's also worth noting, despite the comments I brought up in the previous retrospective, John Dwyer is definitely playing some kind of keyboard or synthesizer, especially on 'Sticky Hulks.' It didn't occur to me until after I finished that retrospective, by the by, that Dwyer's Damaged Bug sideproject began around this time, so perhaps that was some kind of influence on his words and actions? As far as I'm aware, Dwyer never played any sort of keyboard/synth during live shows before Drop. But I digress. You may be aware that the initial vinyl release of Live In San Francisco (hereafter simply Live) came with a DVD of the full album (which, sadly, I don't own, so I can't comment on it) but you may not know that the limited edition version also came with a 7” Flexi-disc of 'Ticklish Warrior.' It's on YouTube, if you want to check it out, though the upload I found has a bit of pop/hiss and it's not an especially revelatory performance anyway. One last thing—does anybody know what the story is with the bleeped out words right before 'I Come From The Mountain' and at the end of 'Sticky Hulks'? My research only turned up speculation that it was the name of the soundman during these concerts, though if that's the case, I'm still confused why they would need to bleep it. Maybe whoever it is told their significant other they had to leave town for a wedding when they actually snuck away to run the sound for these three nights instead? Just a theory.

Like with the preceding studio album, Live is flawless. It ticks all the boxes of what you want from a live album. The recording quality is excellent and puts the two live tracks on Singles Collection Volume 3 to shame. Since this live release is culled from three nights of shows, you get the impression they picked the best performances and finessed it into something that has the flow and dynamics of a single live set. While diehard fans will always want more, Live is the perfect length, managing to cover a lot of ground in just under an hour. We get tracks from all the back to the Carrion Crawler/The Dream era, with 'Gelatinous Cube' previewing the then-forthcoming A Weird Exits. In addition, this buffet includes non-album deep cuts 'Man In A Suitcase' and 'Tidal Wave.' I can't help but pause here and mention the conspicuous absence of any songs from Putrifiers II or Drop—it's almost like they made this for me! Anyway, assuming you also have the DVD, the only thing this live album lacks is the smell of weed in the air and somebody spilling beer on you. I am confident, however, that if you, dear reader, want those things you could easily provide them yourself. One last thing I wanted to note is that it's quite odd how not many outlets reviewed this release. One outlet that did is a now-defunct website that Metacritic has a choice quote/blurb from saying Live has fifteen tracks, because I guess nobody but me bothers to pay attention to the details when it comes to Oh Sees. Oops, am I throwing shade again? I should save some, Summer is only a few months away.

I almost forgot the most important thing about Live: the lengthy workout of 'Contraption.' At almost 16 minutes it was the longest track they had released up to this point. More important is that it and a few other tracks hint at the jammier direction the band would start to take in the studio, most obviously with Smote Reverser onwards. An important distinction to make is that this long 'Contraption' jam is closer to the earlier style of Oh Sees stretching out, lacking any meaningful solos or concentrated group interplay as we see nowadays live, or even on Face Stabber. So yeah, it's not so much a long jam with traditional solos like Cream's first live album as it is Dwyer making all kinds of guitar drones/groans/moans and psychedelic noise while the rhythm section keeps the krautrock pulse going. I know I keep bringing them up and maybe nobody else sees it but me, but Dwyer's instrumental pyrotechnics are almost akin to a spacey/experimental Phish jam, very abstract and rhythmically/melodically “out” or “outside” in the jazz sense of being “out”/”outside.” I have to say, I prefer the current drummer duo of Dan Rincon and Paul Quattrone, though this is likely because they've had more time to play together. Listening close on headphones, Ryan Moutinho does work well with Dan Rincon. Take careful notice of the part around the 12:30 mark where the drummers push things up a notch and Dwyer lets them shine as his guitar gets even more blown out and droney. I think somewhere in here he switches to his keyboard/synth as well, though it's hard to distinguish the two from each other because of how many effects he's been using on his guitar. Make no mistake, the rest of Live is also straight fire, as the kids say—'Gelatinous Cube' and 'Toe Cutter/Thumb Buster' are beasts that show off the dynamics of these live legends and will flatten your chest if you aren't careful. It's not all about 'Contraption', though 'Contraption' is all that*, as the kids say.

With its mix of old songs with new (and brand-new!) songs Live served as a bridging of the gap between the mid-era of the band and the modern-era. This has the side effect of leaving me wishing for a proper live album from the mid-era, and of course, also a proper live album from the modern-era Face Stabber lineup with Tomas Dolas on keyboards. However I get the distinct feeling I am inspecting the teeth of a horse I was just gifted, so I better stop before I get out my magnifying glass and tweezers and start picking nits, too. It's hard to imagine any Oh Sees fan not adoring Live, though if you're like I used to be and you don't see a point to live shows, this may be the cure for your ignorance.

[On a side note, I'm not sure why the track is only called 'Contraption' and not 'Contraption/Soul Desert', like it was on Carrion Crawler/The Dream. None of the info I was able to find indicated they credited Can for the track on this live release, as they did on the studio version, so it must be lacking whatever it is that made the songwriting co-credit necessary before. I'm still terrible at picking out the distinction between the two versions in terms of having/lacking 'Soul Desert.' Perhaps this is one Oh Sees nut I'll never crack.]


*...What's that? Kids don't say “all that” anymore? Hmph. What about groovy? Why are you shaking your head and walking away? Hello...?

Oh Sees Retrospective #20: Mutilator Defeated At Last

One of the most fascinating stories in music history has to be King Crimson. Though their various lineups over the years tended to be more stable than the legendary upheavals of The Fall, the story of them transitioning from the mid 70s lineup to the Discipline era makes for a fascinating tale. I highly recommend at least reading the Wikipedia entry to get the quick and dirty series of events. Effectively resetting the sound and style they had been known for in the 70s, the influence of new members Adrien Belew (who had recently been touring/recording with Talking Heads) and Tony Levin (a criminally underrated and unique bassist, check out 'Elephant Talk' and 'Discipline') didn't so much completely change the band's reputation for virtuosic playing as it did redirect the focus onto polyrhythms, post-punk, and new wave. Of course we all know by now that, other than John Dwyer, there's no certainty with the lineup (and current name) of Oh Sees. They've gone through at least three distinct eras in terms of sound and stylistic focus, to say nothing of the personnel changes. I wouldn't have minded if the mid-era lineup (from 2008 to 2013) stuck around. However, it would have meant missing out on the influences of the members that have rotated through/joined since then, just as King Crimson staying the course would've meant missing out on Discipline and everything to follow.


Oh, right, Mutilator Defeated At Last. That's what I'm here for. I should warn you now, this is going to be longer than usual. There's a-fucking-lot to cover this time out. Anyhow, it was released on May 18^th, 2015...and that's it. Wow, no contradicting release date, it must be my lucky day! Though still retaining Thee Oh Sees as their moniker, this album featured the trio lineup that Dwyer had recruited to tour after the release of Drop. The new drummer, Nick Murray, would only be around for this release (well, he is on Memory Of A Cut Off Head, though that's an OCS release). New bassist Tim Hellman, meanwhile, began to solidify the modern-era lineup. It's worth taking a moment to appreciate what a difference he makes to the overall sound. This is the first time Oh Sees had a dedicated bassist, giving the band a low-end bedrock to stand upon. It's true that Petey Dammit! played bass at times, and sometimes downtuned his guitar and/or played it through a bass amp, though just as often he would strictly stick to guitar, repeating the same riff while Dwyer's own guitar went crazy around him. Oddly, around this time Dwyer was quoted as saying he was tired of keyboards for live shows and that “...the future of the band doesn't hold much keyboard...” Sure, until Tomas Dolas joined in 2018 they didn't have a dedicated keyboardist, though I'm almost positive I've seen live clips on YouTube before he joined the band where Dwyer is playing the organ lines of 'Sticky Hulks' on a little synth or MIDI keyboard...But I digress.


You wouldn't know it from the Metacritic scores, which are surprisingly consistent for Oh Sees, but Mutilator Defeated At Last got some of the band's highest scores yet—outlets like Allmusic and The Needle Drop gave it high praise, rather than the usual middling to above average scores. Ironic, then, that I didn't like it that much when it first came out. I couldn't place my finger on why until I went back and listened to their previous albums. “It's different...it's too polished....it's not as unhinged and wild...it's dialing back the garage rock and experimental elements...” Part of it may have also been that in late 2015 I began to date the woman who would go on to be my wife, and she was introducing me to a metric fuckton of EDM, vaporwave, and lo-fi hip hop. So Mutilator was set to the side and I didn't really think about it.


A funny thing happened on the way to the final opinion. I was in the throes of another serious Diablo III obsession in early 2017, often playing it for hours with the sound turned way down and my own music selections blasting on a Bluetooth speaker. One night I decided to throw the last few Oh Sees releases into a playlist and hit shuffle. Now, in my mind, Mutilator was the poppy/polished album, and A Weird Exits/An Odd Entrances was where they once again really got weird and cool. Pleasant surprise after pleasant surprise hit my dopamine receptors as I thought to myself “damn, this song is fantastic, what album is it from again?” and I'd look down and see that more often than not, the ones that got my attention were from Mutilator. Turns out, this record was the true start of the modern-era Oh Sees after all. If 60s garage rock was the soup base before, then this new era changed to a buffet of 70s music as its foundation. Psychedelic and krautrock stuck around, now seasoned with spicy druggier/jammier classic rock, meaty prog rock, and a few herby dashes of proto-punk, post-punk, and even boogie rock. That's right, Oh Sees beat King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard to boogie rock with Mutilator's excellent 'Turned Out Light.' Let's not get into that tired Sees Vs. Gizz debate, though.


All of this is a long build-up to getting around to saying I now regard Mutilator as a flawless record. It wouldn't be hard to make a case for it being the band's best album ever. I love everything about it—even the strange album cover, with the vinyl record wear-and-tear making it look and feel like something you might discover in the collection of one of your parents from back in the 70s/80s. No song on this release is less than great; many are stone-cold classics that still appear in live sets. 'Sticky Hulks' showed us that they could slow it down and get a bit moody/atmospheric while still giving us something that is undeniably Oh Sees, almost as if they were working on a cover of 'Riders On The Storm' and it mutated into something else. Even the slighter/shorter tracks bristle with inspired ideas and playing: I won't rest until 'Rogue Planet' is the theme song to an Adult Swim show about surfers/skaters in outer space. Meanwhile, 'Holy Smoke' is how you do an instrumental right. Using acoustic instead of electric guitar is a subtle but brilliant change, giving Mutilator more sonic variety while still working well in the overall flow. On a side note, listen to this track and OCS's 'Memory Of A Cut Off Head' back-to-back, the guitar and strings on the latter are highly reminiscent of 'Holy Smoke.' It should go without saying that Mutilator opens with the commanding one-two punch of 'Web' and 'Withered Hand', but I guess I did just kind of say it by saying it didn't need to be said. I think I just made myself dizzy.


Let's move on. Discuss amongst yourselves how it is that this album is only a couple minutes longer than Drop but feels so much more fleshed out and satisfying. Please also take careful notes as I present my TED Talk, “'Palace Doctor' Is An Amazing Cooldown Of An Album Closer That Deserves More Love.” And since I won't be covering them as part of my required curriculum this semester, I'll point those who want extra credit to submit a minimum 300 word essay on how the non-album single made up of the songs 'Fortress'/'Man In A Suitcase' could have been crammed onto the album to bulk up the runtime but it was smartly allowed to breathe on its own. Discuss artistic integrity vs. giving people quantity over quality; compare and contrast this single with the similar Moon Sick EP in regards to it being a fine dessert course following Floating Coffin.


Oh, and a quick reminder before you're dismissed, students: next class we'll be covering Live In San Francisco. Prepare to analyze the form and function of a live album vis-á-vis a band's relationship with their own body of work and the chosen performance style(s). As always, we'll have a purely voluntary luncheon and bong rip session after class. Dig in.

Oh Sees Retrospective #19: Drop

Unless you're someone who keenly follows the personal lives of artists you admire, you may never know why it is that certain albums seem a bit off or very different from what had come before. David Bowie fans must've been mystified when their beloved Thin White Duke of Station To Station fame turned up a year later with the artsy, at-times ambient Low. Do a bit of reading and you'll find out he had developed a hellacious cocaine addiction while living in Los Angeles, to the point he claims he remembers almost nothing about recording Station To Station. Seeking solace and new inspiration, as well as a place not riddled with peak cocaine popularity, he journeyed to Switzerland before settling in Berlin, inspired by the krautrock and experimental music and art of the time. It's always struck me that Drop isn't so different than previous Oh Sees albums but it still feels different; somehow, it just feels off. Turns out there are a number of reasons for this.


Drop was released on April 19^th, 2014. As ever, there has to be a conflicting date to drive me further insane: the Oh Sees Bandcamp page says it was released on the 29^th. I'm assuming that was just a typo since there are several reviews that came out just after the 19^th. But I digress. The album came out at a time of great transition for the band and specifically John Dwyer. You can get the full details on the Wikipedia entry for Oh Sees, but here's the shortish version. In December of 2013, Dwyer announced during a live show “this will be the last Oh Sees show for a long time. So dig in.” After a series of rumors about a Phish-style hiatus or a full breakup, the band clarified by announcing a new record would be released in 2014, hinting at possible live shows. We would also find out that Dwyer was taking some time off to move away from his long-time home, San Francisco. To Los Angeles, in fact; unlike Bowie he doesn't seem to have coked away his memory as a result. In February 2014 Drop's release date was revealed, and that it would be another album recorded mostly solo by Dwyer, as with Castlemania and Putrifiers II. Somewhat lost in all the signal noise was that the other members of Oh Sees—Brigid Dawson, Petey Dammit!, and Mike Shoun—had left the band. Well, it's unclear if they left or if Dwyer wanted to start fresh in L.A. True, Dawson would continue to record with Oh Sees (and OCS!). However, since she never toured with the post-2013 lineups (at least as far as I know, corrections are appreciated!) I personally don't consider her a 'true' member any longer. Call it hair splitting if you will. Sometimes you gotta split some hairs, man.


In revisiting Drop for this retrospective, it became clear that I still have conflicting feelings about it. How much I can attribute these feelings to the influence of Dwyer moving to L.A., it's hard to say. Liars certainly recorded very different records when they were in Berlin vs. in L.A. Anyway, there isn't much concrete information out there about when Drop was recorded. The Wikipedia entry says something to the effect of “it was recorded in Sacramento without the other then-members of the band” but since we don't know when those members left, it could have been anytime from late 2013 to early 2014, after Dwyer had already moved. Anyway, it doesn't seem productive to slide further down that rabbithole, so let's clamber back up to the record itself. As with the other pseudo-solo albums that preceded it, Drop is largely the product of Dwyer and stalwart producer/collaborator Chris Woodhouse. It has the same scattershot character of said predecessors, and though I think it works more often than it doesn't, it certainly has casting stink eyes back to the disagreeable Putrifiers II.


More than any Oh Sees release, Drop keeps me off balance. Its paltry 31 minute runtime simply isn't equipped to allow the variety to cohere into something consistently enjoyable. The album is bookended by its two most compelling pieces: 'Penetrating Eye' rips and snorts out of the gate, ready to throw down and mow 'em down, while 'The Lens' is the band's best attempt yet at a whimsical 60s British orchestral psych-folk piece, with a vague 'Penny Lane' vibe. I appreciate that 'King's Nose' is trying something new but it doesn't pull it off, the transitions between sections seeming sloppy, the song as a whole overstuffed with ideas. I can already hear you yelling about it so, yes, it's true, 'Encrypted Bounce' is a classic Oh Sees track....for live shows. In the studio, recorded mostly solo by Dwyer, it's robbed of the fierceness and band-interplay it needs to take full flight. Listen to the drumming on headphones sometime, and compare it to what the modern live lineup brings to it. In fact, as a whole Drop has that issue of a single person trying to recreate a full band on their own, so that tracks such as 'Savage Victory' and 'Drop' sound oddly hollow and manicured. Throughout most of the album, Dwyer's vocals are easier to pick out, though he often uses a more mellow/soft delivery that makes me picture someone recording the vocals late at night and trying not to wake up their roommate. 'Transparent World' starts off strong, with its blown-out bass/guitar and drunk AF keyboard sounds grinding down the pavement, until the ethereal vocoder-ish vocals kick in, adding nothing. This song should've been an instrumental, it would ease the whiplash transition between it and the following album closer.


Perhaps the best way to sum up Drop is to imagine that Floating Coffin was recorded solo by Dwyer, instead of live-in-studio by the band. And that it used some of the Moon Sick EP tracks in place of the polished coherency of the actual Floating Coffin tracklist. And that it had weak vocal performances. And that it was eight minutes shorter. Anyway, I might be more forgiving of Drop's flaws if it was an EP, though only just a bit more. It's not Putrifiers II but it's no Castlemania, either.