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Rating:
Among the groups praised by Scaruffi (a true recurring nightmare for every music lover wandering daily on the web), there are these Archers of Loaf, a Chapel Hill band unknown to most. It is an indie-rock with rough sounds and a clumsy flair, pavementian to the bone, that references the Replacements and the somewhat sloppy and psych noise of Polvo - just to stay within city limits - with garage-punk enthusiasm and carelessness. Simple pieces, with a taste for hasty melodies - the typical crooked pop drift, college rock citations and clichés - and Eric Bachmann's voice, quite dispensable, torn between spontaneous-amateurish-humorous temptations and the testosterone illusion, which seems to be self-induced, of singing over Minor Treat's tracks instead of his own band's.
The album, in truth, starts well: “Step into the Light” is a cadenced and atmospheric rock, with a vaguely meditative and seventies flavor, offering space to the charming - though not very original - approximations of the guitars, engaged in out-of-tune and fragile electric duets, with the backing vocals filling the gaps. With the next track “Harnessed in Slums”, the band makes things clear - neo-beat riff at the opening followed by energized and punky indie rock, complete with Oi!-style armor, filled with changing guitar noise and simple arpeggios to contrast the hyper-vitaminic shouting of the vocalist. Mini-bridge in Polvo style, and then back again headlong until 3 minutes and 16 seconds. Its festive urgency is truly overwhelming, although a bit predictable and not exactly brilliant. The subsequent “Nevermind The Enemy” is then dull and out of focus, annoyingly full of indie clichés, starting with the dreadful imitation of the most uninterested Malkmus on the microphone and the shameless guitar feedback, with an insipidly alternative and trivially banal refrain. “The Greatest of All Time” is a simple electric ballad with ironic lyrics, sung with hilarious vigor, but nothing more. Much better is “Underdogs of Nipomo”, a bit Polvo and a bit Modest Mouse in Black Flag sauce. Perhaps the (little?) charm of the Archers lies in songs like this. Certainly not in the following “Floating Friends”, one of the worst imitations of early Pavement ever heard, nor in the falsely anthemic arena-rock of the playful “Fabricoh”. In poor taste is also the neo-hardcore jest of “Nostalgia”, while “Let the Loser Melt” is (by now) the typical piece of the Meatball Archers (Christ!), with its elementary metrics and narrative urgency of the singing, pleasant but not that much. The “melodic” “Death in the Park” is worth a listen, moodier, more considered and constructed, with a couple of really well-chosen harmonies. Disheartening is the childish nihilistic declamation of “The Worst Is Yet To Come”, while the band-like dissonances of the psycho-cartoony fanfare of the final “Underachievers March and Fight Song”, complete with a whistling "piping" by an unusually inspired Bachmann, are overall worth the ticket price.
In conclusion, it is a strongly amateur band, dabbling in the commonplaces of independent rock by gathering a handful of traceable influences, and having in the abrasiveness of the vocal style, very pronounced compared to the context, the only true element of personality: a bit too little, and all in all not even that well spent. Do yourself a favor and listen to the Beatles, in defiance of the indie cut-and-paste Talibans scattered over the web.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
02 Harnessed in Slums (03:16)
Too harnessed in slums, to rock you wrap your throat.
Standing over your common ground.
Snuff the leader with the bad assed plan.
Take what you want from the palm of his hand.
We're running joke, running jokes, running dry.
Strip the color from the meat of my eye.
Lick the loser, just don't make him stick.
Lay it on heavy and make the wrong size fit.
I want waste.
We want waste.
They want waste.
Slaves want waste.
Too harnessed in slums, to rock you wrap your throat.
Standing over your common ground.
We're running joke, running jokes, running dry.
Strip the color from the meat of my eye.
I want waste.
They want waste.
We want waste.
They want waste.
Side to side, with the tired smile
Cut into your face.
They let me down for the second time straight.
With thugs and scum and punks and freaks,
They're harnessed in slums but they want to be free.
Snuff the leader with the bad assed plan.
Take what you want from the palm of his hand.
Lick the loser, just don't make him stick.
Lay it on heavy and make the wrong size fit. (?)
I want waste.
We want waste.
They want waste.
Slaves want waste.
Side to side, with the tired smile
Cut into your face.
You let me down for the second time straight.
With thugs and scum and punks and freaks,
They're harnessed in slums, but they want to be free.
(repeat)
06 Floating Friends (03:48)
All of my friends have floated away.
They clog up the valley and drift up to outer space.
It was just like the old ones,
Just like the times before
When all of my friends floated away.
They always _________ one by one.
Living in their pockets, living in their pockets.
They were always sincere.
Hip to the freshest ideas,
The latest ideas.
I'm clinging to fresh, new mistakes.
I've got some new faults to force on you.
It won't be wrong to prove you wrong.
It's never hard to prove you wrong,
When I'm clinging to fresh, new mistakes.
And I've got a smile one mile long.
Hidden in their pockets, Hidden in their pockets.
I'm always sincere.
Hip to the lateste ideas,
The freshest ideas.
All of my friends have floated away.
Connect the valley to the astral plane.
(repeat 4 times)
08 Fabricoh (03:05)
Fabricoh is the favorite sound around.
Watch the wholesale slaughter of the whole downtown.
Stepping off the ship in limbo. (?)
It's the spit on his chin that makes us nervous.
It sets the high price from the crowd that's gathering
Cutting off the false communication.
And we missed the registration.
In our mental hibernation.
Well the strangest violation of all. (?)
Fabricoh will have his say someday.
What's ________________ to the ones in the way.
Swearing off his occupations.
Yes it's the spit on our chins that makes us strong. (?)
It's the sounding off of a crowd that's gathering.
Rocking out, rocking out.
________________________________
You go past the bronx station.
To get the strangest violation of all.
Yes it's the spit on his chin that makes us nervous.
Yes it's the spit on our chins that makes us numb.
It's the high price from the crowd that's gathering.
Cutting off the false communication.
Slipping off the ship in limbo.
________________________________
Getting out of a crowd that's rocking.
Rocking it out (10 times)
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