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Sometimes, simple is great—whether you’re in the mood to just jam out or not, stripped down rock songs will always be there to take you away. Such is the case with New Paltz, New Yorkers, Quarterbacks and their incredibly high-energy twee-punk sound. On this self-titled debut album, these three gents don’t give you a song that lasts even two minutes, but they do give you lots of them, leaving you to question just why anyone would bother with creating longer tracks.
The general sound on this album is that of borderline out of control spastic drumming, electric guitar riffs that just won’t quit, and the vocals that just try to keep up with the instruments. Opening with a quick number, “Usual,” they instill this high energy from the beginning, that classic electric guitar sound making sure you’re wide awake before they fully launch into things. From here they don’t really stop—while they may slow down slightly, the whole album seems to run on pure raw energy. The lyrics come at you full force, and little details all become apparent at once in this youthful release.
Just because the overall sound on this album is hyper-fast and feisty doesn’t mean that it lacks tenderness. Surprisingly, there are a ton of softer moments embedded in the mix, which provides the necessary juxtaposition to the twangy punk guitars and nasal vocals that serve as the main focus of the group. These moments sometimes have whole individual tracks devoted to this sound, and other times they come as a blip interred into an otherwise rambunctious track. The tender, slower moments seem to be wound into the fiber of Quarterbacks sound, and this gives the album a real emotive quality that harkens back to 90’s emo bands. This melancholy tone runs through the album alongside the playful, which is quite effective for the band—see “Knicks,” or “Center”
While the hyper-short song lengths may seem a little ridiculous at first glance, at the end of Quarterbacks, you understand why the band has such a choppy catalog of songs for you to enjoy. Simply put, It works perfectly for this genre; the brevity of each track makes you appreciate it more, as before you even get the chance to really sink your teeth into the number it’s gone. Such is the same with the album as a whole: if you blink, you’ll miss it, so keep your eyes and ears open.
I haven’t heard from Total Babes since Swimming Through Sunlight, but I’m glad they’re back at it with a new LP ready to hit stores. I’ll admit, the bits of horn throw me off a touch; I mean, is that a bee buzzing in my ear? Regardless, the song’s got this catchy tenacity hooked around the stop-start vocal delivery. The guitars do have a jagged edge, and the horns begin to show themselves as an instrument meant to create something beyond your typical garage tune (laser sounds included). Look for their new effort, Heydays, to hit stores on May 19th via Wichita Recordings.
