Great Grandpa - Plastic Cough
(2017 Dbl Dbl Whammy)
(2017 Dbl Dbl Whammy)
Great Grandpa's poppier than the sum of its parts, and all the more striking for it. According to their press kit, the quintet is the product of a "mututal love of noise and math rock", but the instrumentation of their inaugural LP, Plastic Cough, shows more fondness for the former. Hailing from Seattle, the band is often likened to the sound their home city's bygone grunge scene -- their towering fuzzscapes, however, shed the dissonance of Sub Pop's early 90s output for anthemic surges of determination. More indebted to Broken Social Scene than Nirvana, Great Grandpa whisk dollops of optimism into their bummed-out snarl. "In due time, I'm tryin' my best", offers Alex Menne atop a sizzling chorus, perhaps to make amends for the twangy desolation that prefaced it: "Got caught up in loose ends / All my friends are almost dead".
At its best, Plastic Cough goes for broke, tossing every hook, riff, and vocal acrobatic it can muster at a rumbling wall of distortion. Opener "Teen Challenge" is a case study in this kind of noise-rock maximalism. Revving its sonic engine on some Weezer-esque dissonance, the track's muted power chords gather enough energy to launch into a menacing chorus, allowing enough space in its static for Menne's yawp-y delivery to jut through. Imagine Crying's Elaiza Santos with a case of the hiccups that somehow manages to keep her on key. Subtract the band's chiptune melodies for an extra layer of bass that envelops everything in its path. Tack on a guttural guitar solo for gnarled emphasis. Whether or not you care to invite it in, "Teen Challenge" bores its way into your memory like trepanation. It commands attention.
The band's forays into higher tempos are also quite successful. "NO" earns its capital letter, splattering clashing colors of harmonic paint across a canvas of snares. The intro to closer "28 J's L8R" waxes midwestern emo before melting into a slogging gob of bubblegum sludge metal. "28 J's" is by far Plastic Cough's most impressive feat, fiddling with rhythm, dynamics, and spaced-out improvisation -- all the while lyrically indulging itself in corny humor and B-movie horror theatrics. Most of the record hits hard enough to re-visit many times, but it's this coda that I can't stop spinning. Here's to more a wildly experimental (yet still fun) Great Grandpa in the future.
Plastic Cough doesn't always hit the nail exactly on the head. The brief "Grounded" marches to an off-kilter beat that should pay off, but doesn't quite do it for me. "Pardon My Speech" winds itself through so many melodic contortions, you'll need a map to navigate them. Despite these rough patches, though, the album is often a blast to listen to -- occasionally, (especially on tracks 1 and 10), it flirts with classic status.
