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The Rosebuds

Night Of The Furies

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by jimtarnation on 07/22/2007

Break out the Molly Ringwald dance! Both arms in front, with the occasional above head arm swing! Not a lot of dance floor needed, mostly we're standing in place but we're still dancing our asses off! Night of the Furies marks The Rosebuds first trip into the way-back machine, emerging as Orchestral Manoeuvers in the Dark minus the British singer/British themes, plus a few female vocals and whole lots of the word "oh." Consistent and strong, melodic and dark, NOTF is a really welcome addition to a certain genre of pop music which seems currently lost or mired in just promulgating the past, not 1. accepting it and 2., and more importantly, promoting it. After listening to this record for the nth time, it’s really hard for me not to imagine were this released in a different time/era, I’d see kids decked out in their best Rosebuds get-up (for the ladies, the blonde dye-job, for the boys, More Ivan Than Ivan) patrolling the food court at the mall on Saturday night. This package of synthy-super catchy mildly goth-esque songs, it really hits that synthesizer “oboe” setting note for me.

Armed with slowly strummed guitars, lots of vintage synthesizer effects and a drum machine, The Rosebuds have very successfully created a record that sounds both like homage & startlingly fresh. The melodies are simple and catchy, the "ooohhh"s are plentiful, and the songs are surprisingly not sweet but dark and moody. Co-head Rosebud Ivan Howard sounds, frankly, like my friend Charlie when he sings, but his voice is not nondescript, and the falsetto is aplenty throughout. When the other co-head Rosebud, Kelly Crisp, takes the lead on the third song, her barely smoky tenor (think more talking you through the song, with the occasional singing-like timbre creeping in) is again not remarkable, but the first lyrics she belts out are "I think my grandma has a piece of land, I think i'm supposed to take it when she's dead." What??? Hooray for having the lack of pretension to try to make every song some epic theme. I honestly really appreciate that, and it cracks me up every time I listen to it. How many other pop singers reference their grandma in the first line of a song?

When listening to Night of the Furies for the first time, eventually, you start waiting for the slide down the mountain. It surely can’t be a semi-goth, synth pop record that kicks ass…released in 2007, right? Six songs in, and it's still a noir-pop record that sounds like it could have come from Ally Sheedy's vault. "Silja Line," the seventh song, begins with a simple acoustic guitar strumming and a nautical narrative about the captain of a ship on the real Silja Line ship, a Swedish canning vessel. As the song builds, it adds a moody keyboard, atmospheric "oh"s, and builds to the chorus, with what sounds like a real, giant chorus of sailors chanting along. Pretty easy to imagine steins of beer being swung through the air. You get the picture.

So, honestly kids, it's time to shake the mothballs off of that Breakfast Club DVD (Ever hear the rumor that the original cut of Breakfast Club was 4 hours long? I did). Put yourself in a non-retro Pretty In Pink moment. Change your hairstyle to emulate your favorite Rosebud. After a night vamping around the cemetery, take it to the dance floor and rock Night of the Furies. Highly recommended for fans of Hall & Oates, Wire and/or The Cure, and everything in between.

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My Mixtape Get Up Get Out [MP3]

Album Details

Year: 2007
Label: Merge
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Tracklist

1	My Punishment For Fighting
2	Cemetery Lawns
3	I Better Run
4	Get Up Get Out
5	Silence By The Lakeside
6	Hold On To This Coat
7	Silja Line
8	When The Lights Went Dim
9	Night Of The Furies

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