The Portland-based trio Menomena returns valiantly with their fourth full length album, Mines. Since the 2007 release of Friend and Foe the band has toured with the masters of tension, Bloc Party, and are currently headlining with BB favorites, Suckers. Earlier this year Brent Knopf’s side-project, Ramona Falls, toured with America’s favorite wine guzzlers, The National. Their journey to recognition has been pretty bizarre, but then again, so is their music really. Beneath the face of their unique tunes ticks a robot in music’s clothing. The band developed proprietary software years ago to help them make some sense of licks and riffs they were practicing on, which has become a unique part of their composition process. The Terminator of music?! Maybe. Evil Bee doesn’t make it seem like very good cover. But if they are, then its with great irony that Mines gives us a more sincere look into the lives of the writers behind the music.
Lyrically, Mines seems to be a balance of self assurance and self doubt. You get a tasting of their sensitivity on the opening track with the confession, “You’re five foot five not a 100 pounds/I’m scared to death of every single ounce.” But this is countered immediately by the fist-pumping “TAOS” which does some chest-beating for the band, “I’m not the most cocksure guy/but I get more bold with every smile.” Despite a number of raucous rock tracks and silly misspelled track titles, Mines plays as the band’s most personal work. Soul-bearing lines pop up more commonplace, “Go home I’d like to, stumble to bed and lay beside you/until we’re even or romantically bored, whichever comes first.”
Notably, Mines exhibits the band’s best vocal performance to date. The gentler ballads provide a clean insight into the vocal prowess of the whole band, who split duties on vocals. “Oh Pretty Boy You’re Such A Big Boy” achieves the highest note I’ve heard out of Justin Harris (3:35- dammmmn), after a whole song of highly controlled, lower octaves. Blind-siding and sky-splitting. The accents on the harmonies from the whole band are tastefully inserted throughout the whole album. The grittiness of the chorus on “TAOS” seems better suited for Mick Jagger. And the post-production on the whole shebang spreads an extra laminate of smoothness.
Perhaps most importantly, Menomena has built a reputation as a highly dynamic band with unpredictability from track to track, and Mines is no exception. Track’s like “BOTE” compete with previous releases “Pelican” and “The Monkey’s Back” for heaviest track from the band, with screeching guitars and blaring baritone sax on the breakdown. “Five Little Rooms” paints an apocalyptic scene with piercing intensity and sorrowful acceptance at once. There’s a fair share of storms hovering over the album. But not withstanding a few tear-jerkers, such like “INTIL.” They’re able to cover a wide ground without losing cohesiveness between these tracks. Maybe its the band’s finely crafted build ups, which lift through both the softer and harder tunes? Or maybe that’s just what Skynet wants you to think…
- matthew hunt
