Pig-Out

Field Music (Measure)
Field Music
Memphis Industries (2010)
3.5 stars (or 4 per disc)

After taking a two-year break to pursue various solo projects, the boys of Field Music seem to be sprinting to catch up. (Measure) is two discs and twenty tracks long. Yep. Those that are familiar with Field Music's sound (or indeed that of the Brewis brothers' solo outings as School of Language or The Week That Was) will know that just one Field Music track is likely to contain multiple time signatures, musical styles and vocal harmonies, so the thought of twenty of them is ... Well, I'm exhausted just thinking about it. In a way, devouring music of this quality on this scale is like buying a massive bag of lollies, planning on eating them over a week or two, and then scoffing the lot in a single sitting. It's glutenous. A single, precious jelly bean tastes so much better than a bagful. So, with that in mind, I propose the following: Approach the two discs of (Measure) as two separate albums -- two intelligent, intricate, impossible tight guitar pop albums -- and be happy in the thought that you just picked up one of the finest musical 2-for-1 deals in recent memory. They say the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts. In this case, the whole and the sum of it's parts are nowhere as valuable as the parts themselves.

Artwork: B
More in line with the artwork of their debut. The tight, five-line musical staves (is that what they're called?) spattered with bright, fluid paint is actually a nice visual representation of the band's sound.

The Review That Is

The Week That Was
The Week That Was
Memphis Industries, 2008
3.5 stars

So far the disbanding of Field Music has produced two impressive offshoots - School of Language and now The Week That Was - and that's only two-thirds of the original line-up accounted for. Field Music had a knack for crafting impeccably tidy, impossibly clever tunes, the main credit for which clearly goes to the two Brewis brothers Peter and David. While David’s School of Language debut was like a third Field Music album, Peter’s The Week That Was, a concept-album of sorts, takes that band’s intricate, artful and almost mechanical approach to pop music and pushes it toward ... musical theatre. While Field Music’s songs would often change direction three or four times in three or four minutes, they always seemed to make it out of their musical maze in the same shape in which they went in. This time around that’s not the case. Combined with that unmistakeable Sunderland accent, the schizophrenic Yesterday’s Paper might as well be the score to Paddington Bear: The Musical. And listening to tracks such as the kinetic The Airport and album standout The Good Life you’d swear Brewis must plot his music on big sheets of graph paper, it’s that mathematically complicated. But even if The Week That Was isn’t everyone’s cup of earl grey, it definitely bodes well for the future of the Field Music team, both together and independently.

Artwork: C
A photo of a bunch of neat looking Brits staring at a TV with some Helvetica Neue over the top. Groundbreaking. It's neat (the inside photo pinpointing all of the contributors is quite nice) but, I don't know. Maybe a little too neat for my liking.

Published in mX, Thursday November 20, 2008.

Technical College

Sea From Shore
School of Language
Thrill Jockey, 2008
4 stars 3.5 stars

When news surfaced that Field Music were 'taking a break', I'm sure it wasn't just my shoulders that slumped a little. In just two albums (2005's self-titled debut and last year's Tones of Town) the Sunderland three-piece had written, published and catalogued the book on inteligent, summery hook-filled guitar pop, so the short note on the band's website gave about as much consolation as an "it's not you, it's me" on a high school break-up letter. Thankfully, Sea From Shore, the first album from Field Music's singing guitarist David Brewis' School of Language solo project, really picks up where Tones left off. Brewis recorded nearly every sound on this record himself, with members of the Futureheads, and other friends, filling in the gaps. The resulting songs are brilliant, unpredictable and catchy - this is a Field Music album, but with a loose bedroom aesthetic. It will be interesting to see where the other members go with their solo outings, but if this is any indication the signs are good - Field Music are not just dividing, but multiplying too.

Artwork: C+

Published in mX, Thursday April 24, 2008