SectionsAnnuals' album 'Be He Me' sincere, memorable, a big hit with me
kevin Ehlers
Issue date: 3/16/07 Section: Features
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The band Annuals is a curious musical creature. The 6-piece North Carolina band is led by 19-year-old Adam Baker, and none of the members are over 22 years old. After listening to their debut album "Be He Me," the majority of us will reflect on what exactly we've done with our lives up until now. I'm guessing releasing a highly acclaimed album and having toured in every state but Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire and Rhode Island didn't make your list.
After being truly amazed by their live show at Randy Bacon's South by Southwest Showcase last weekend, I decided to dig up this album again. Considering "Be He Me" was my No. 1 album on last year's top 50 list on my blog, this may seem a little biased, but after seeing them live and the album has yet to get old even after five months, deciding which album to review this week was a no-brainer.
With "Be He Me," comparisons to Animal Collective and Broken Social Scene are almost inevitable. The former can be heard in the strange, atmospheric controlled chaos Baker and his bandmates conjure up in the studio, while the latter is heard in the disjointed melodies that feel like scraps of songs they couldn't quite finish. So they just blended them together and saw what resulted. When all is said and done, Annuals still sound unlike anything you've heard before.
The album gets straight to the point with the beautifully haunting opening track "Brother", which starts with the sound of crickets, acoustic guitar, and mellow strings, only to build into a sudden crescendo of melodic static until Baker's shout of "Go!" finds the band exploding onto the scene in what could easily be my favorite musical moment of the past year.
All seriousness soon disappears as "Dry Clothes" chirps into the scene with its fluttering electronic background and joyful guitar riffs. I read an interview with Baker where he said he wrote this song about the movie The Sandlot. While that is cool enough for points in my book, I can't help but scratch my head at lyrics like "There's a knapsack rally for the stranger who told of a spider and a purple toad" and "Should you talk of your son on the run/Your tongue will be ripped out by ducklings." How those lyrics represent The Sandlot is beyond me, but it is this curious blend of often surreal lyrics with multiple singers, layered instruments, and an overly optimistic feel to each song that keeps you coming back time and time again.
After being truly amazed by their live show at Randy Bacon's South by Southwest Showcase last weekend, I decided to dig up this album again. Considering "Be He Me" was my No. 1 album on last year's top 50 list on my blog, this may seem a little biased, but after seeing them live and the album has yet to get old even after five months, deciding which album to review this week was a no-brainer.
With "Be He Me," comparisons to Animal Collective and Broken Social Scene are almost inevitable. The former can be heard in the strange, atmospheric controlled chaos Baker and his bandmates conjure up in the studio, while the latter is heard in the disjointed melodies that feel like scraps of songs they couldn't quite finish. So they just blended them together and saw what resulted. When all is said and done, Annuals still sound unlike anything you've heard before.
The album gets straight to the point with the beautifully haunting opening track "Brother", which starts with the sound of crickets, acoustic guitar, and mellow strings, only to build into a sudden crescendo of melodic static until Baker's shout of "Go!" finds the band exploding onto the scene in what could easily be my favorite musical moment of the past year.
All seriousness soon disappears as "Dry Clothes" chirps into the scene with its fluttering electronic background and joyful guitar riffs. I read an interview with Baker where he said he wrote this song about the movie The Sandlot. While that is cool enough for points in my book, I can't help but scratch my head at lyrics like "There's a knapsack rally for the stranger who told of a spider and a purple toad" and "Should you talk of your son on the run/Your tongue will be ripped out by ducklings." How those lyrics represent The Sandlot is beyond me, but it is this curious blend of often surreal lyrics with multiple singers, layered instruments, and an overly optimistic feel to each song that keeps you coming back time and time again.
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