Tristeza’s new album, Fate Unfolds
From the surreal opening to the feverish end, Fate Unfolds captivates with a tonal palette that is both broad and gripping. Indie kings of the southwest, Tristeza, have been at it for slightly over a decade. Their latest full-length delivers without a drop of disappointment. Fate Unfolds is drenched with the seemingly long lost art of crafting an album that plays as one solid piece. I could pick several ’singles’ that I hear on this record, but to do anything but drop the needle and park it does a huge disservice to the artistry and arrangement of this record as a whole. Herein are huge washes of guitars and synths, layered with drums dubbing back and forth from programmed to acoustic with ease and a backbeat that is anything but ‘indie rock’.
Instrumental bands get a bad rap. It’s mostly because of the Canadian melodramatics that ruined it for everybody in the late nineties. If I didn’t know this record was slated for a release in just a couple months, I don’t know that I could have accurately pinpointed a time period on the recording of these songs. While several production elements hint at a 70s dub feel, there is a mature tension, and raw rock element that is an emergent sound for Tristeza. It’s almost like certain elements invoke the image of Lee Perry slapping hi-fives to Steve Albini behind the mixing console.
Tristeza are also helping spearhead a trend that is integral to the survival and validity of independent music. There will be no US compact disc release of this album. Better Looking Records will distribute the digital format of Fate Unfolds, and Wildlife Vinyl will be pressing the vinyl.
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Tagged: Fate Unfolds, Tristeza
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Also by DAVE MATA
Everything Is Terrible website
I met one of the Chicago contributors of this New York, LA, Chicago collaboration site in front of a local bike shop this past summer. He was happily showing off his latest thrift store VHS scores to a mutual friend of ours. I slept on the “blog” he said he was collecting the tapes for for some time. Sometimes I make mistakes. Everything is Terrible is a brilliant library of all things unsettling. These are not posts of mindless YouTube anomalies. These are serious and hilarious documentations of what could be lost on most people were it not for these ironic excavators.
Lasers and Fast and Shit perform Pittsburgh
This band is one of the most promising acts to appear in Chicago in the past few years. Their live shows have set them apart from their stoner-spazz rock counterparts, with an elaborate light set up that they bring to each show. Yes, you see correctly, lead vocalist joe is ‘playing’ the lights. I can’t imagine these guys ever quit working being that they build their own amps, and drummer, Mizzola plays in like ten other great Chicago bands. Look out for Lasers and Fast and Shit’s new 7″, Introduction, out now.
The Monome interfaces provide seemingly endless possibilities for combinations of aural and visual amazement. It’s a wonder to me that people are still using midi keyboards as trigger devices to elude the fact that they can’t play an actual instrument. With sleek design and eco-friendly packaging, its no wonder the first run in 2008 sold out in two minutes. Whether they decide to release one or two hundred devices, the Monome 64 is going to be available again in January 2010.
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