Search - Paul Newman :: This Is How It Is Lost

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pancake_repairman | gfjdhgfjhgj | 07/13/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I assumed this band was broken up, so it was a nice surprise to find out they had a new album coming out, but it says it was recorded back in 2001 so I guess they probably still are broken up, I dunno. It also says the whole album was written in a single week, half the time they claim to have spent writing the previous album, Machine Is Not Broken. Unless the guitarists hadn't picked up their instruments at all in the previous year leading up to recording the albums, I find it difficult to believe that they weren't constantly experimenting with the chord progressions and melodies which ended up making up the framework of the album. I can't imagine that they really could just churn out an album of music so great and intricate at the drop of a hat, although considering how similar to the previous album most of this music sounds, maybe that's exactly what they did. It makes the album seem a lot less special if you think that they could just make a new one every month. Anyway aside from all that, this is a really great album that reaffirms Paul Newman's status as the masters of my instrumental post-rock (with occasional vocals) universe. This album is the sound of Mogwai and Explosions In The Sky having their asses handed to them. It's a bit more meandering than Machine Is Not Broken, the chord progressions and melodies don't lock into solid grooves as well or as often, but the Sonic Youthy chimey guitar sound and all those densely harmonic chords are still there shining just as brightly as ever."