Record Review: Thee Oh Sees [Carrion Crawler/The Dream, In The Red]

By Jennifer Graciano

San Francisco’s favorite band is at it again; not with a single or a split effort, but with a full on full-length. This knocks their album quota up to two for 2011. With so many releases you have to wonder whether Thee Oh Sees might have lost a bet. Do they have a stockpile of tracks tucked away? Maybe they enjoy making music so much that they are, maybe literally, bursting with chords and lyrics. Whatever the reason may be, trust Thee Oh Sees to deliver worthwhile jams.

Riddled with long-winded psych cuts, Carrion Crawler/The Dream already stands out from the bands last album. Castlemania, released only earlier this year, was brimming with the catchy eccentric sounds Thee Oh Sees are so well known for; utterly short bursts of energy to appease any Oh Sees addict. The unruly sounds heard on Castlemania take a back seat here as songs like “Opposition” and “The Dream” play out like a sludgy stream of delicious psych slime to sink into while Dwyer’s particularly shrill vocals float lazily about.

Thee Oh Sees [Carrion Crawler, In The Red]

After slowing down the RPMs for just a brief moment, Thee Oh Sees are to release their second record this year with Carrion Crawler / The Dream. The band are back on their distinctive sounding brand of garage rock; check out the track below as you stare into the insanity that is the album cover above.

Carrion Crawler

Record Review: Thee Oh Sees [Castlemania, In The Red]

By Jennifer Graciano

With Castlemania, we get Thee Oh Sees’ hundredth release. Let’s face it: Thee Oh Sees release material like madmen. They’ve got their full-lengths, 7”s, EPs, and participating on a handful of compilations. Their latest effort has a lot of catchy moments, and some parts that will leave you wondering about the sanity of the San Francisco based four piece. Frontman, John Dwyer, has become omnipresent throughout garage rock music; founding, contributing, playing in bands all throughout Northern California with the ease of a musical chameleon. His fluidity translates through all of Thee Oh Sees' feats as they change directions and release material as fast as, maybe faster, than the seasons change throughout the year.

Castlemania has Thee Oh Sees bring back some of the awesome psych sounds on The Master's Bedroom is Worth Spending a Night In [Tomlab, 2008], equal parts catchiness from Help [In The Red, 2009] and Warm Slime [In The Red, 2010], but only to an extent as the band trades in some of their longwinded chords for more unruly noise. Thee Oh Sees have meandered about garage sounds for a while, and listening to Castlemania, they’ve managed to keep things fresh and inventive this time around.

The album is comprised of bursts of good old rock that don’t get old, and aren’t too short, the longest track barely gets past the three minute mark. ‘Eccentric’ sums up the album perfectly, there’s a haphazard feel to it and you might as well be listening to the band perform live. Have Thee Oh Sees mastered the art of garage rock? They do seem to find new ways to keep us listening with each release.

Thee Oh Sees [I Need Seed Music Video, In The Red]

Thee Oh Sees [I Need Seed, In The Red]

"I Need Seed" is the latest song from the prolific San Francisco band Thee Oh Sees. Its been made known that Castlemania will be the first of two albums released this year. According to John Dwyer, the band have taken a more stripped down approach and described the music as "summer-y and poppy". Castlemania will be a blend of both original songs and covers and is out June 14th.

I Need Seed

Pre-order the album here

mp3[via]

Thee Oh Sees / Sic Alps / Ty Segall / The Sandwitches [Great American Music Hall, San Francisco 02.09.2011]

Thee Oh Sees

Thee Oh Sees / Yellow Fever / Bare Wires [The Independent, San Francisco 08.07.2010]

Bare Wires

Yellow Fever

Thee Oh Sees

Yo La Tengo / Thee Oh Sees [The Fillmore, San Francisco 04.23.2010]

Last week was a very tough decision for me. Yo La Tengo was going to be in town and since I missed their performance at Treasure Island Music Fest last year in order to get a good view for The Flaming Lips, I thought this would be a pretty good chance to see them. However, having to decide between Camera Obscura, Thee Oh Sees or Sic Alps as the opener proved harder than I ever imagined. After carefully contemplating my choices I went with Oh Sees for a couple reasons. This was to be there first time at the Fillmore and this place does something to musicians. Its a famous venue with a rich history of music culture for San Francisco. They are also one of my favorite bands and I wanted to see them live once more before they head off to Europe for the summer.

They got to play for about 40 minutes and the energy, as expected, was cranked up from the start; Enemy Destruct sounds good every time I hear it and is the perfect song to get things going. They played essentially almost the same set list as they did from their show at the El Rio in March but I have been listening to the newer material lately so songs like I Was Denied and the epic closer that is Warm Slime kept sounding incredible to more I hear them. I'm a huge fan of John Dwyer's guitar playing and stage presence. His energy explodes from his amps and you can't but feel the music. Brigid Dawson on vocals adds an element of necessity that only enhances the songs and John's reverb.

Yo La Tengo made the stage after the set change and started their performance with about a 10-15 minute jam session that had Ira a maniac on his Red Fender. His guitar skills were unbelievable and I was totally engaged on his shredding. In fact, Ira goes crazy on any instrument he touches, whether it be guitar or keyboards. After the jam session they slowed it down a bit and the vocals were all shared by the band members only to speed it up again with more sessions of Ira brilliance. This was my first time seeing the band live I was very impressed by them. This show was one of the best last minute decisions I've made this year

Thee Oh Sees [I Was Denied]

A new Thee Oh Sees song has officially been released off the upcoming album Warm Slime even though the band have been playing a handful of new songs at there shows (see March 25th post for a live performance download of Thee Oh Sees). All the new tracks sound incredible and wild as ever, can't wait for this release to come out in mid-May.

I Was Denied

Thee Oh Sees [Warm Slime]

San Francisco's, Thee Oh Sees will be having a new album coming out on In The Red records on May 11 2010 (same date as the new Woods so put some money aside) and I am really looking forward to this one. Each release has seen Thee OCs move forward as they harness their fuzzy garage sound and as a result each new album is better than the last. The below image is the album artwork of the LP.

Thee Oh Sees 2009 performance at the Murcury Lounge in New York can be found here

Warm Slime can be pre-ordered here

Thee Oh Sees / The Fresh & Onlys / Ty Segall / Baths [El Rio, San Francisco 03.10.2010]

With SXSW right around the corner and not being able to go, the Wednesday show at the El Rio was the perfect substitute. The Bay Bridged is presenting the Bay Area Invasion over in Austin so this show was a little taste of what to expect. Thee Oh Sees, The Fresh & Onlys and Ty Segall all in the same venue was a treat and an added bonus another chance to see up and comers Baths.

The show started around 9 PM and packed around a small stage Baths took the stage and played a performance that seemed to me to lack the energy they had last week at Bender's bar. The vocals were a bit inaudible and not much guitar creativity except for the last song. Prepping for their tour with Oh Sees, they played a number of songs I didn't recognize from the free show so it seems they have a decent amount of songs ready to go; hopefully an EP or full LP is in the works because this band has potential.

http://www.myspace.com/baths

Ty Segall soon followed and having loved his self titled release and his new album with Mikal Cronin I was very excited to see him perform. A little delay at first due to some mic connection problems and some tempers flaring but the wait was worth it. Ty started off slow with gentle guitar strummings, then within seconds the pace shot up by 100%. He debuted a lot of news songs, half his set was new material, and the crowd was into it. His energy was great and the music sounded great live. He may have the look of a surfer but he is a beast on a microphone.

http://www.myspace.com/tysegall

The Fresh & Onlys seem to release so much music it is hard to keep up; two full albums, a new EP and countless 7''s and splits. Tim Cohen leads this group and they instantly present themselves as polished musicians. The music is more arranged and conducted and their set up was much complex, they used a full drum kit and guitar pedals which were not seen in the first two acts. The set was perfect and full of 60's-70's pop/psychedelica. Their girl back up singer was a notable absent so an easy fix to that was to bring a friend from the crowd. A great performance from a great band, they will be touring with King Kahn and The Shrines this Spring.

http://www.myspace.com/thefreshonlys

Lastly the band everyone was here to see. Arguably the best band coming out of San Francisco but for sure the most exciting. As soon as the first notes of "Enemy Destruct" were played all hell broke loose. The bar erupted into a violent mosh as the drunk and high patrons lost their minds. John Dwyer was on form and his guitar playing and shredding was unrelentless. The energy level was through the roof and the songs were blazing by at an incredible pace. After a few stilettos to the foot and hits to the back and ribs, I slowly migrated to middle where it was a bit calmer to take in what was Thee Oh Sees. A band you HAVE to see now before they blow up because this is one of the better bands of the garage-punk scenes. A little tweet from the Bay Bridged the next morning pretty much summed up the hour plus set: @thebaybridged: A guy humping the air along to Thee Oh Sees, you know it's THAT good.

http://www.myspace.com/ohsees

For more videos: http://www.youtube.com/seetheleavesblog