FILE UNDER GUILTY PLEASURE.
So, the fine folks at FUZZ Records passed along the new Lovemakers EP, Misery Loves Company, a multimedia release including videos of each song. Dropping on July 24, the five-song recording is the first in a series of EPs scheduled to hit stores every 6-7 months (begging the question as to their next full length, but no news on this front right now.) New to FUZZ, The Lovemakers last full-length, Times of Romance, was released on Interscope in 2005, the label from which they have since departed after being "shackled by the narrow vision of the corporate structure." Ah, to be beautiful, talented and artistically-tortured.
Anyway, Times of Romance was a grand record of candy-coated dance-pop, the saccharine-sweet aesthetic of which was only mediated by lyrics showcasing a razor-sharp wit that wasn't afraid to call culture as it is. My personal introduction to the album came through Maynard, who made sure that when we first started DIRT in 2004, the album was in the jukebox at the Tavern on Main, sharing rack space with the likes of to Kenny Chesney and Elvis' greatest hits. On the rare (to regular) occasion that the PA would crap-out, we would cue the album to maintain the dance party. I've included the Billboard-worthy single "Prepare for the Fight" in this post, but if those bittersweet hip-shakin-even-when-you're-driving dance tunes do it for you, you should check out the album. Even if it's just for the moment of vindication you feel when you hear a totally hot LA rockstar-type sing about how pissed off he is that the girl he wants to dance with keeps her distance in the corner on her cell-phone; ahem, she "prefers to dance alone."
Oh yeah, I didn't mention that The Lovemakers are a boy/girl duo, comprised of the lovely Lisa Light and Scott Blonde (those are their names, seriously. Lisa has a Stanford MA in Marine Biology!) who met while working together at an Oakland record store. Lisa was dating the manager, Scott moved in on her, and the rest is dance-floor history. Thus, the music released by these literal lovemakers (or former lovemakers, Google for more gossip on that) is electro-dance-rock that achieves a personal dynamic not quite possible when boys are singing with boys about smoking in the corner, watching their crush dance with other scenesters, or girls singing with girls about how much that scenester sucked once they got home. Listening to The Lovemakers is like being privy to the inner-workings of some perfect couple's relationship, if they were Bay Area hipsters with musical talent. Hipsters who also happen to double as DJs at some of the city's hottest parties. Lisa and Scott went to DJ school after the success of Times of Romance had even "cross-armed hipsters shaking their asses," and began making appearances at weeklies such as Popscene, the long-running Thursday party thrown by San Fran hipster legend Omar.
Misery Loves Company, arriving 2 years and a label change after Times of Romance, marks some time to grow up, and it seems that age has encouraged a bit of irony. Not that TOR didn't have its moments: "Set Me Free," sung by Lisa, laments the torturous fact of living with an ex after he's moved on ("Living together is fun 'cuz baby I love you so/But we broke up a month ago). But Misery Loves Company takes those little moments of coy commentary to a wholely new level, remarking on culture not only in the lyrics, but in the instrumentation of the songs themselves. The new EP is totally amazing, in a completely ridiculous way. It's dance music, for sure, but a kind that seems to make a statement about rock music in general. This almost over-bearing and definitely intentional "dose of epic rock" has led even Scott and Lisa to describe the new material as "Led Zeppelin covering Prince."
The 5-song album starts out fast, dancey and easily digestible, but listeners hit a speed bump at track 3, "Naturally Lonely," an oddly-Sinead O'Connor-esque dark ballad. The tune, while a might confusing after the dance party we thought was just getting started, is still a poignantly-delivered love song, quirkily inspired by the death of Lisa's cat. This musical epitaph for the "feline love of her life" even indulges 80s-hungry hipsters with a swoon-worthy "Purple Rain" style guitar solo at the bridge, added in the studio when the two were straining to perfect the track. Number 4, "We Already Said Goodbye," follows the strange moment of rock ballad on "Lonely" with a return to a classic Lovemakers sound: moog-heavy and sweetly iced with Tiffany-inspired female back-up vocals. The final track "Save Me" is the masculine answer to the electro-epic-ballad of "Naturally Lonely." Want to know more? Just listen, I can't even attempt to describe this in words beyond saying that my first thoughts were of Pink Floyd, if they decided to hang out in SF hipster dives for a week.
The Lovemakers are certainly a duo I'm keen on watching in the near future. A certain nostalgia is responsible for my initial attraction to the group, but I'm enthralled by the distinct departure from their major label sound offered on the new EP. Plus the marketing ploy of teasers hitting stores a couple times a year is certainly one way to keep the blogs active, and I'll happily be proved one of them.
Stay tuned for a release party at DIRT, btw, for the new EP... if my words haven't inspired a trip to the record store, maybe some free schwag will.
