Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Two Thinking Fellers Union Local 282 Solo Projects




Reviews from Trouser Press:
-Mr. (Brian) Hageman's solo album, Twin Smooth Snouts, is a little simpler than full TFUL282 music and also less accessible. He usually uses one or two contrasted or combined sounds (as opposed to the Fellers' four or five), retaining the band's loose, detuned string sound; his lyrical imagery is cryptic, thick and vaguely country-ish. He mostly sings in a monotone, and his instrumentals drag on (great titles, though: "Johnosaurus Wayne," "Shave the Gum," "Hamburger Pharmacy"). There are some nice touches, like the sound of a vibrator, erhu, car radio and metal rod, and creative stereo separation. "Rosa" transforms a traditional Cuban melody into a bar-room ballad.
-Going under the name the White Shark, goofier, odder Feller Mark Davies (wears skirts, plays banjo) is behind the Muggy Bog EP. A cheerful and complex musical vision, its wry lightness is based on the oddness of ordinary beauty: the chorus of "Waiting for the Day" is "doing the dishes, scrubbing the dog, getting out of bed and going to work" (of course, the day he's waiting for is the Apocalypse ). One song is sung from the point of view of mosquitoes ("We suck blood as a means to survive"); "Sodium Chloride" is a mini-musical about a man addicted to salt. There are also extraneous covers of Rod McKuen and Burt Bacharach.
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Go figure Fellers side projects would be wacky listens. Each does its own thing and is enjoyable in its own way. A must for TFUL 282 addicts and something different for anyone else.

Twin Smooth Snouts:

http://www.mediafire.com/?7364ai5z4pj9dzu

Muggy Bog:

http://www.mediafire.com/?jhjoha981ilmtqi

2 comments:

  1. Hi, I recently published on Zeronoize netlabel an EP entitled "Ad nutum" with the pseudonym of Satisfacción Lab, the style could be described as a cross between musique concrete, noise, tape music and dark psychedelia. If you want, you can download, listen it and if you are convinced, it would be great to be on your blog.

    http://zeronoize.org/release/zn021/

    Thank you very much!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the Muggy Bog. I have been a TFUL fan for almost 20 years and have been looking for this LP for awhile. Great Blog and thanks again.

    ReplyDelete