Search - Arms of Kismet :: Eponymous

Eponymous is the debut CD from postmodern pop alchemist Arms of Kismet. Featuring ten slices of sincere irony, it drops echoes of Beck, Freedy Johnston, Bob Dylan, Aimee Mann, David Lowery and a gaggle of other great songwriters into a Waring blender, and reconstitutes them as something fresh and new. From fractured Americana ("Cuckold of Titan," "Sepia Eyes") to beatbox hip-pop ("Karma Never Forgets," "Beautiful Career," "Standby"), Arms of Kismet paints new and abandoned genres in shades bright, soft and psychedelic. From updated '60s melodicism ("Hang," "Foldback") to new-breed alternative rock ("Are You My God," "Alive and Awake," "Sail Seven"), Eponymous is a canny synthesis of styles, a neo-"singer-songwriter" album more adventurous than confessional. Written and produced by Mark Doyon (who released three CDs in the 1990s as Wampeters) and mastered by Jon Astley (Tori Amos, Jools Holland, Pete Townshend), Eponymous mines existential terrain. Blending traditional instrumentation with atmospherics, samples and blips, it considers what it?s like to be born and not know why, what it?s like to know death awaits but not the hour of its arrival. Pitching a tent between the camps of Americana, hip-hop and classic rock, it summons a warm, analog vibe that sounds as natural in a coffeehouse as it does on a car radio. It makes for toe-tapping, tragicomic rock 'n' roll. Doyon, who published a book of fiction, Bonneville Stories, in 2001, thinks of Eponymous like a collection of short stories. "Songs speak in a more emotional way, maybe, but they?re still stories with characters and plot and a point of view. They?re compact fables." Eponymous features Washington, D.C. indie-scene denizens Kowtow Popof (Eat My Dust), The Crowd Scene (Turn Left at Greenland), Janna Audey, Rob Santos, Eamon Loftus, Scott Goodrick and others.