Soundtrack To Tear Us Apart, the third LP by Atlanta,
Georgia's Young Antiques, cannot help but be the
garage/power-pop trio's best release to date—and there's a few
good reasons why:
Its origins. Engineered by Tim Delaney (Selmanaires,
Swimming Pool Q's) in the basement of Atlanta's historic
Biltmore Hotel, the album is raucous and energetic, focused
and passionate. It features previously unrecorded live show
favorites such as the post-punk scream-a-long "Crown" and the
moody domestic drug-tale "Laws" nestled alongside
newcomers like the angelic power-pop "Tadao Ando" and
noise-guitar stomp "(There Isn't Anything That Means) Nothing
At All."
It's been a long time coming. Singer/songwriter Blake
Rainey and bassist Blake Parris formed the group sometime
around 2000 and soon released their first full-length: Wardrobe
For A Jet Weekend. In 2003, the band recorded and released
Clockworker on the Two Sheds label in Atlanta. But after
supporting both albums touring through the Midwest and up the
northeastern coastline, the 'Tiques entered a forced hiatus as
Clockworker drummer John Speaks exited the group. Rainey
soon went on to release two solo albums (also on the Two
Sheds label) and Parris joined local honky-tonk rockers
Sodajerk.
Pop in to see a random rock show on the Atlanta scene in the
past few years and you'd be hard pressed to not have heard
lament for the 'Tiques long absence. Fortunately, Sodajerk
drummer Kevin Charney convinced the Blakes that they weren't
finished with the project by a long shot, and became the final,
galvanizing piece of the band’s equation in the summer of
2007.
Soundtrack To Tear Us Apart is a forty-minute snapshot of a
talented rock n' roll group picking right back up where they left
off, continuing into the latter half of this decade with the same
energetic stride they had when this new damn century began.
With its own raw and potent mixture of post-punk, new wave, garage rock, and power pop that eerily drifts somewhere between 1977 and 1982 in spirit, The Young Antiques’s compositions tend to be short, catchy, and brash, following the canon of the Ramones, Elvis Costello, the Jam, and the early loud, fast rules of the Minneapolis scene.
The opposite of a Zach Braff movie, huh? Let me guess: damaged characters who come together after a long absence to re-find themselves, set to a soundtrack that oozes quirk and suicidal references? Oh wait...that's Garden State. Maybe you guys should re-think your status. :)
