Stumbling into the woods, Brian Wilson is having a bad mushroom trip. No matter what direction he walks, he can not escape the vast pine-tree forest he has inexplicably found himself in. His brothers and bandmates are gone. Pop music is gone. He managed a tiny campfire in an attempt at survival. The fire grew slowly, but strangled and choked everything around it until Brian could only see a technicolor wall of flames.
We Got Hot & Died is the debut album from Chicago outfit Pretty Swans, the brainchild of former Tinyfolk sensation, Russ Woods. Combining downbeat harmonies and an utter singularity of expression, Hot is a gargantuan forest of sounds to digest.
My immediate points of reference for Pretty Swans recall the American Northwest. The creaky and organic sounds of Mirah and The Microphones are apparent everywhere on songs like, "Go Die in a Car Fire," "We Can Dance," and "Two Trees." Jim Laczkowski's production work here is fantastic, getting the guitar to sound like shimmering leaves. Yes these tunes all have a uniform haze, but you'll never lose your way.
"You Fell Over" is a very clear focal point on Hot. The arpeggiated tenor guitar gnashing like wind chimes, Russ's soothing harmonies describing a single moment in a single moment. We need to figure it out. Repetition is our messiah. Maybe we'll figure out what that moment means. Let's figure it out together.
My only grievance towards Pretty Swans is that the record, at seventeen tracks, is a beast to tackle. I liken We Got Hot & Died to the Lord of the Rings Extended Editions. They contain the extra character moments ("They Found Fire"), longer battles ("I Am Eating Them All") and gratuitous asides of beauty ("Birds and Birds and Birds"). Yes, some tracks are unnecessary to get the story, but once you've heard them, could you in good conscience clip them back out?
Listen:
Pretty Swans-"You Fell Over."
Look:
Pretty Swans at Pattern Hungry Records
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