Jason Frederick Jim Duffy Matt Siefert Casey Meehan Chris Kralik with Kris Poulin and Jeremy Lemos
Influences
Inspired by The Means
Sounds Like
Jason Frederick (Love Story in Blood Red, the Ribs) says he got the kick in the ass he needed to make this record when he learned in late 2006 that the Means—a band he’d fronted in Columbus, Ohio, between 2000 and ’03—had reunited without telling him. “They were playing my songs and using pictures from my sketchbook as banners,” he says. “I wasn’t so much pissed as inspired.” In 2007 he put together his own Means in Chicago, played out under the name, and even dropped in at a couple studios to bang out this dirty blast of noise, which splits the difference between garage rock and artsy posthardcore—it’d fit pretty well on a playlist between, say, Hot Snakes and Red Eyed Legends. Having sent a message to his old bandmates, who’ve since stopped playing as the Means, he changed his own group’s name to Cool Devices and scraped together enough money to finish the release. The EP emphasizes attitude and aggression over melody, which from some bands can get to be a drag, but these seven songs are light on their feet and breeze by in what seems like a fraction of their 20-minute running time. Cool Devices is downloadable free at rockproper.com, and Frederick, who’s been living in Brooklyn, plans to move back to Chicago so he can support it; he’s playing a release party here at the end of the month.
from: Chicago Reader (sharp Darts)
Jason Frederick is filled with a level of rage that seems increasingly rational with each passing day. Jason has founded projects in Ohio, New York, and Chicago, and now with Jim Duffy (drums), Matt Seifert (bass), Chris Kralik (guitar), and Casey Meehan (synth) he gives you Cool Devices. When he discusses his motivation for the angst ridden track on this eponymous debut he talks of a playful angst toward his former band mates. However, by the end of the recordings session, at Steve Albini's Electrical Audio Studio, the scope was much larger. In fact, I contest that it would be difficult to record in an album in late 2008 or early 2009 and not allow a political anger to steep in.
Regardless of the subject, Cool Devices plays a fierce form of rock that is bound to make you nod and possibly thrash your head.
from: www.thedelimagazine.com/chicago
Particularly appropriate that this would come over the transom a couple of days after seeing the Chrome Cranks at Santos Party House: the debut seven-track album by Chicago band the Cool Devices shares a no-holds-barred, roaring ferocity and a smart, riff-oriented post-Stooges vibe with the recently reunited LES New York legends. This effort has more of an authentic Detroit feel than most of the innumerable Stooges imitators out there, frontman Jason Frederick assailing the mic with relentless, snotty energy. The whole thing has a live-in-the-studio feel, well-rehearsed but with a spontaneity that’s hard to get just doing the songs track by track. Right off the bad, they take it to redline with (This Is Not A) White World, muted guitar chords sputtering with natural distortion with more than a bit of an early Jon Spencer Blues Explosion feel. Some fiery tremolo picking kicks off the second track, Fatso, snarling riff-rock with trebly Farfisa or what sounds like it by Casey Meehan of Jitney (another good band recently reviewed here).
Once I Became One Of Those is careening and atonal in the Chrome Cranks vein, practically death metal but with swing instead of stomp. Come Get Me has the guitar punching a single chord over and over again as Frederick rails and the organ kicks in at the end of the verse, an effects pedal left oscillating wildly at the end. The absolutely evil, chromatically-charged The Line Starts Here staggers along with growly Stranglers bass over some tricky time changes. The big, obvious hit is Primitive, dark second-generation minor-key garage rock also evocative of the Stranglers with that oldschool organ swirling as the chorus hits a peak. The album winds up with Someone Stop Them, running a1-3-4 riff over and over again like a less sludgy Thee Hypnotics as the organ distorts, then hands over the reins to the guitar which eventually goes apeshit while Frederick screams the tortured mantra of a title. A Guantanamo parable?
from: http://lucidculture.wordpress.com/
Cool Devices
Cool Devices (Power Recordings)
Cool Devices pick up where Jason Fredrick's previous group, The Means, left off, or as I should say, he left off with them (The Means soldier on in their Columbus OH, homebase, with a new singer/guitar player at the helm). After the perhaps less than amicable split with the aforementioned Means, Jason recorded a few records with the more acoustic-based and ballady Love Story in Blood Red. The self-titled Cool Devices CD is a return to the raw form of the aforementioned Means. Recorded before Fredrick packed up and moved to NYC, this seven song disc contains more of the barely contained rage and the ominous, threatening lyrical subject matter that fans of the aforementioned Means have grown accustomed to. Included on this disc, in fact, is a reworked version of "Primitive" from the The Means' 2002 album Vil/Viol CD (DPG). All in all this disc is a good primer for, or a reminder of the hard rockin' and screamy energy of the aforementioned Means. Cool Devices keep the creep rock torch burning. Long live rock that gives you the creeps--Steve Stoned
from: http://reglarwiglar.blogspot.com/
Longtime favorite THE MEANS are back and - we've got to say - better than ever. The group issued three albums before disbanding, but primary songwriter JASON FREDERICK has recently reorganized the group, and they've just finished writing a strong batch of new material.
