After conquering a dream conceivable by all indie music makers, over-night success Grand Archives released a luminescent and harmonic self-titled debut. Grand Archives is a prime case of instantaneous triumph as the Seattle quintet played its first show and caught the attention of the music moguls over at Sub Pop Records. Next thing you know, Grand Archives is signed to a highly credible label and performing with Modest Mouse at Seattle’s historic Paramount Theater. Front man Mat Brooke is a prominent name in the Seattle music scene. He is respected for his partnership with Seattle’s raved about but now deceased band, Carissa’s Wierd. He is also known for kick starting Band of Horses’ career. Abandoning Band of Horses as it was just heating up, Brooke shifted into a totally different gear and he decided to open a bar called the Redwood. Brooke managed to juggle a music career along with the opening of the bar in Emerald City. With a new project, Brooke and the rest of the gang that comprises Grand Archives hoped to incorporate sounds of the ’70s. The plan was to echo vocally-important bands from the era in music when Bread, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and Moody Blues dominated. Grand Archives started with three friends in September 2006, all of whom once played in a band. Drummer Curtis Hall (The Jeunes), bassist Jeff Montano (The New Mexicans) and guitarist/keyboardist Ron Lewis (Ghost Stories) came to a consensus to make a pop record. Fifth member Thomas Wright shortly hopped onto the bandwagon to complete Grand Archives. Innately finding its sound, Brooke and the boys ran into difficulty when it came to polishing off a new style. Hopping from studio to studio in Washington State throughout the summer of 2007, the gang dabbled with unorthodox instruments. Across the 11-track record you will pick up on instruments ranging from the trombone to slide guitars rubbed with violin bows. Don’t let the complexity of the instrumentals scare you off. Grand Archives keeps the origins of classic pop in tact, loading up on tight percussion and hooks weighed down with sho-la-la-las and ba-da-dums. When Brooke and Montano trade off on vocals they sound like a cross breed of Simon and Garfunkel and their inspirations, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.
All but one song on “The Grand Archives” are written by Brooke. Lewis contributed his words to the harmonica-heavy track, “A Setting Sun.” Although the main goal of this record was to achieve an accessible ’70s pop feel, the band gets a little esoteric on tracks like “George Kaminski,” which happens to be inspired by a convict that once owned the largest four-leaf clover collection in the world. During the making of “The Grand Archives,” the quintet from time to time had a willingness to improvise. One track in particular that was improvised, “Breezy No Breezy,” came out sounding like underground smooth jazz-fusion with a hint of dub reggae. This instrumental piece, which is less than two minutes, serves as their most imaginative and surprising. Brooke’s falsetto and the violin go together like spaghetti and meatballs on the dreamy song, “Sleepdriving.” The anxiety-free song serves as one of their most pleasurable and finely-tuned numbers. Grand Archives know how to have fun with powerpop on tunes like “The Crime Window,” but also put themselves under the blue light on nostalgic numbers like “Index Moon” and “Swan Matches,” in which Jenn Ghetto, the other half of Carissa’s Weird, contributes backup vocals. As a newly-formed band, the naivet’eacute; Grand Archives has does not inhibit its ability to make a decent album. Discordance among its members is hardly traceable when they are all on the same path.
Joe Stahl can be reached at [email protected]
