THIS is how you do the whole disjointed-genius, Jad-Fair-channeling-Van-Dyke-Parks thing. You get eight or nine buddies to play every instrument in the world and then take yourself about 3 million times less seriously. Then you stamp a skateboarding horse on some used clothes and sell them for “however much you feel like paying” out of a box in front of the Soiled Mattress and the Springs show. Perfection.
- From Vice magazine Sundaes issue - Best album art of the month!
Quiet Hooves play pop songs of a sort but make use of impressively thick textural spaces, of arrangements that refuse the basic geometries of the radio-friendly and bored.
There is a keen attention to sonic balance, to timbral weight and aural event, at the heart of the group’s eccentric bricolage-pop; the limber lineaments of Julian Bozeman’s songs slide through and butt up against an omnipresent and shimmering drone of horns, violin, electronics, and toy piano; and Mercer West’s agile and angular drumming serves as a medium through which the two sound-worlds -- organized in Stravinskian blocks or spatial compartments that would make Pierre Boulez smile (if indeed he ever smiles) -- can interact.
- From The Kansas City Star
Working in an eight-piece format, in which two of the members switch between instruments, puts you in a good position to craft some interesting ditties, and Quiet Hooves don’t miss the opportunity. They have quite a few really excellent, Original (capital O intended) songs, and they don’t overdo them. That’s to say they don’t seem intent on stupefying the audience with “complex” soloing, or extended vamping, etc., but aim to share the fun of music (and it’s power as well – there is considerable ideological substance to some of their tracks). So individual parts are often kept technically modest, but the band moves well together and its arrangements are allowed to do the necessary work of rocking the boat. (If you shoot yourself in the foot, chances are the boat’s gonna get a hole in it, too.)
This is an alluring project to be sure, and as I continue to collect pieces of the Quiet Hooves puzzle, I am more compelled to keep working on it (i.e., paying attention). A nice show, and the trumpet so lovely.
- From Flagpole Live Reviews
In a small town just out of reach of any of the best maps sits a little country house, off off off the main road, behind a clump of tall pines. It's a fine white, strong flat paneling outside the porch and up the side to the little room at the very top. The room whose roof is the one thing the sun hits its nose on while going up the hillside. In this room there's one soft small bed, a light faded row of books, a painting of a river, dust on the desk, and two things on the windowsill: a plant, mouth open and ready to catch the dripping blood of the sun as it floats and races by, and a crystal. A crystal that looks, when held up to light, or held in the tightest dark, like a whole mountain of glass. With base camps and tree lines and snow caps and sweeping rock faces with little foot trails and caves and drifts and clouds. And it's cursed. Don't touch it.
From Said The Gramophone - "hott r nott" track review
Οι Quiet Hooves γράφουν pop τραγούδια! Περίπου.... Ορμώμενοι από την Athens, GA το τελευταίο τους άλμπουμ είναι μια σειρά από ξεχαρβαλωμένα και κατά κάποιο τρόπο παλιομοδίτικα pop τραγούδια που με τον έναν ή τον άλλο τρόπο σου φέρνουν στο μυαλό καλλιτέχνες σαν τον Van Dyke Parks ή και τον Robert Wyatt χωρίς να προσπαθούν καν! Αντιθέτως δείχνουν σαν να μην παίρνουν τον εαυτό τους στα σοβαρά και απλώς να κάνουν κάτι που διασκεδάζουν! Όπως θα έπρεπε όλοι δηλαδή! Προσδίδοντας με αυτόν τον τρόπο έναν αέρα DIY αισθητικής και παραχωρώντας προς τέρψη των ωτών σου μερικά αριστουργηματικά τραγούδια όπως το, θα - μπορούσε - να - είναι - ήδη - κλασσικό, Bigg Boy....
- From Not Your Average Music Blog | 
