LowCloudCover- I Took a Second Too Long

The members of LowCloudCover call themselves “manic slowcore,” but pigeonholing them in a genre – especially one with “core” tacked onto the end of it – isn’t as easy as one might think. This music isn’t quite soft and pretty enough to fit into the shoegaze category, although the droning, effects-laden guitars are there, and it’s not quite psychedelic enough to be hippie music or angry enough to be punk. The closest comparison I can think of is Sonic Youth in their mellower moments, but with more of a garage rock hominess and less of an epic space trip. The vocals have that sort of plaintive, wailing quality that seems to be big in the emo and punk scenes these days, so that aspect might be a bit off-putting for people who were expecting Slowdive and the like, but the musicianship and production is gorgeous. Besides, once you slip into the tranquilizing guitar instrumentals on the zoned-out second half of “Where Did You Go” or the building crescendos of “The Last Lemming,” you won’t be paying much attention to the singing, anyway. This is good stuff, and it’s too bad more bands aren’t making this kind of music these days.

Pick up this EP, especially if you’re a fan of Medicine or the Jesus and Mary Chain, and visit them online at www.lowcloudcover.com