Museum Mouth

Sexy But Not Happy

Written by: TL on 29/03/2012 16:06:46

I'm not quite sure what clicked, but when I first heard music from North Carolina trio Museum Mouth, I instantly thought that they would become one of my favourite new bands of the year. To my ears they sounded like someone had taken Murray McCleoud - of Scottish alterna-rockers The Xcerts - and put him in an indie-punk band with post-punk inspirations, and in my head at least, that cocktail sounded like a sure shot winner.

After having listened to the whole of the band's new album "Sexy But Not Happy" however, I must admit that I've had to curb my enthusiasm at least a little bit. The album, which is self-released and entirely home-recorded, does indeed have a sound that's quite post-punk, reminding me instantly of bands like Yuck and The Jesus And Mary Chain, except Museum Mouth seem more intent on retaining faster punk rock tempos in their music as opposed to those bands. The vocal recordings are scratchy and echo-y, as they ring out on top of crunchy, distorted guitar chords and fuzzy bass lines, and in fact the guitars are often so blurry in the background that you'll find yourself being more engaged by the bass.

The problem for the record is that, while records from similar bands, like Yuck for instance, sound like the band has purposefully mastered the echoing, minimalist post-punk sound, "Sexy But Not Happy" sounds like it is what it is partly because Museum Mouth just don't have the means or the experience to produce a better recording. This impression means that the aesthetic doesn't really have the strength to carry the listeners attention the whole record through, and despite some fairly catchy numbers like "For Mom", "Certain Doom" and "Buzztrain", the album does hence get a bit samey down the stretch. That's not to say that Museum Mouth might not be on to something here, because I think they could be, I just think this record is maybe a little too stripped down for its own good, and a slightly more developed sound and songwriting technique might work wonders on future released.

Download: Certain Doom, Buzztrain, For Mom
For The Fans Of: The Jesus And Mary Chain, Yuck, The Raveonettes, Lemuria
Listen: facebook.com/museummouthband

Release Date 23.01.2012
Self-released

Related Items | How we score?
Comments
comments powered by Disqus

Legal

© Copyright MMXXIV Rockfreaks.net.