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Crystal Skulls
I swear, I see the best bands open for The Mountain Goats. In the first half of 2005, I happened to catch two shows on the southern leg of their tour -- one in Austin and one in Denton -- where Black Mountain and the Crystal Skulls opened. I was utterly charmed by the Crystal Skulls' live show, but was more than little weirded out by their name. I had a junior high boyfriend who was totally obsessed with the paranormal -- who didn't, really? Right? But do you remember what the deal was with the 13 (or 12 or however many there are) mystical crystal skulls from the Reader's Digest Book of Paranormal Mysteries? I totally had to hit Google to refresh my memory -- creepy!
Anyway, the Crystal Skulls are anything but dark and weird (sure would be a great name for a goth band, though) and really, I might have expected them to be called the Sugar Skulls instead (which, you know, wouldn't be a bad name for a band, actually -- if you wanted to start a 'skull' band trend to surpass the 'wolf' band trend...), what with the band's sound located on the bittersweet pop edge frosted with just a tiny bit of creepiness and all.
As a matter of fact, It's hard to know exactly where to position the Crystal Skulls, exactly -- there's a bit of the jazziness found in Karate and Everything But the Girl frontwoman Tracey Thorn's early solo albums, and a whole lot of Franklin Bruno's witty lyrics and delivery. On top of that, there's deep, reverberating echoes of an array of 70's and 80's pop -- everything from Harry Nilsson to Steely Dan to Television to Elvis Costello. At the same time, the Crystal Skulls are so incredibly tight in that Spoon-like way -- there's no superfluous instrumentation or chamber pop flourishes to be had on the band's debut album, Blocked Numbers; the rhythm section is tight as hell, the guitars are used as strategic weapons, and lead singer Christian Wargo's sardonic and wry voice swings from friendly, easy confidence to wolfishly sexy and back again in the course of one song, winning you over after just a few words.
In the end, what I can tell you is Crystal Skulls have made a grown-up record, not the kind of nonsense that's being pushed by early 20-something kids with a penchant for "borrowed nostalgia" -- heck, Pitchfork didn't even review their debut album and last I checked there weren't any lemming-like music bloggers fawning over the work of this deceptively challenging band. The Crystal Skulls' work is the kind of pop music that comes from a seriously deep and abidingly weird relationship with your bizzaro record collection -- as well as a Sisyphean struggle with faith -- Wargo was raised Pentecostal and had stints in indie Christianity-flavored bands Pedro the Lion and the Danielsen Famile (both of whom mixed indie rock and God long before Sufjan Stevens and Page France made it slightly adorable and twee to do so), and spent a "disturbing" stint with Jesus People USA. The fact that he got out of a cult -- that'screepier than any story about crystal skulls that were left behind by aliens with the Aztecs and hold the answers to the mysteries of life, the universe, and everything.
Crystal Skulls - Every Little Bit
Crystal Skulls - Beat Me To It
Crystal Skulls - Locked Down
The Crystal Skulls' official website. Two more tracks can be sampled here; additionally there a few new songs from their forthcoming album, Outgoing Behavior, on the band's MySpace page. Buy Blocked Numbers from Amazon or the iTunes Music Store.
Posted by Little Miss Rock'n'Roll at 01.31.06 at 2:51 AM
Comments
good call on crystal skulls!
i found out the other day that my radio station had this album on playlist.yes.i used to thrash "no room for change" when i first found out about suicide squeeze. what a great song! another band i feel has been unjustly ignored by many.whatever happened to wiskey biscuit? i remember them being quite similar and pretty good too.
Posted by: baz at 01.31.06 at 4:46 AM
Ahh...nice. I heard "No Room For Change" a few days ago and it stuck with me. Soooo good.
Posted by: Sheeni at 01.31.06 at 12:53 PM
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