Ed Schrader's Music Beat - Jazzmind (Load, 2012)

Ed Schrader's Music Beat

Jazzmind

Load

2012

Rating: 8 gas chambers out of 10

I have long been a proponent of Ed Schrader's Music Beat live - they often tour and open for Future Islands, and when Future Islands aren't playing they tour on their own.  So I was both excited and apprehensive to finally hear an album by them - would I like it as much?  Would it change my live experience?  Do I worry too much about dumb pointless shit?

If you aren't familiar, ESMB is a two piece - Ed plays a single floor tom and sings, and Devlin plays bass while contributing the occasional backing vocal.  They have two tempos - fast and slow.  The fast songs are, considering the sparse instrumentation, pummeling numbers, barked at you by a man you would assume is psychotic if you didn't know better.  There is absolutely no one else close to similar to this band, so I'll compare the fast mode to PIL meets Karp.  Then there are the slow numbers, when Ed's voice sounds a little bit like he is channeling Ian Curtis, and the recordings were made inside of a cavernous abandoned cathedral.  These slow songs would almost be creepy if they weren't so damn enjoyable. 

The whole thing is eleven songs of blistering or morose glory, and barely over eleven songs long.  And listening to this debut album only has me more excited to see them play live again.