Monday, May 31, 2010

Single Review: Manatee-Indecision

As if Slumberland needed another reason for you to love them, they've gone and dropped this almost wasn't slice of high strung pop brilliance on us to enjoy. Manatee was an apparently short lived San Francisco ban fronted by an ex-member of the Black Tambourines who existed for such a tiny amount of time they never even put out a release of any sort. Until now. thanks to Slumberland, some of the few recordings of Manatee have been released as this wonderful little single.

The first thing that will strike you about this single is the production. Despite the band having an ex Tambourine in it and this being a Slumberland release, it has an unbelievably clean sound to it, more akin to those Pants Yell! albums Slumberland has been putting out. But it works perfectly with how the band is trying to sound, with the pristine vocals front and center and all the little extra things they add can be be heard. The guitar comes off as Feelies-ish and the bass could have come straight from a (newer) Shonen Knife song. It mushes together perfectly though, forming the excellent on-kilter tart pop song that is "Indecision". "Fifteen Minute Drive" is an equally great, if minutely better, track. It comes off as derivative of the A-side at first until the fuzz bass kicks in and it all falls apart at the end, all the while sounding like a great lost Pains of Being Pure of Heart tune with more sheen. Why Manatee did not stick around I won't know, but I can hope Slumberland can find and put out more music from them.


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