Saturday Looks Good To Me
All Your Summer Songs (2003)
Scott Heisel
So there's this band called Saturday Looks Good To Me, right? They're from Michigan, and they're the brainchild of Fred Thomas [of Lovesick, His Name Is Alive, and many more]. The basic premise of said band seems to be "let's play fairly straightforward 60's-esque pop songs and record them in a vintage style, making people think they really *are* fairly straightforward pop songs actually from the 60's."
Yeah, it's kind of confusing, but it's the best explanation I can come up with. The cast of musicians on this record [almost 30 strong in all] feature some of indie rock's notables like Ted Leo and Tara Jane O'Neill contributing vocals, but the album is so confusingly put together that I have no idea who plays or sings what where.
Each of the album's 13 tracks sound like they are from a time capsule that was buried under Motown Records in the early sixties. While each of these songs contain that vintage sound [which really makes me wonder how Fred recorded these songs], they are unique enough from each other in most cases. The upbeat numbers are here, the ballads are here, the just plain "artsy" tracks are here, and somehow they all seem to coalesce into an easy-to-swallow album.
My biggest complaint about the disc is that each song runs into another - that is, there is no down time between songs, but no segues either. One ends and another begins without even a split second in between them. Maybe Fred was going for a "turning the dials of a radio" effect, in which case I applaud him; if he just decided to do the sequencing like this just to be difficult, then I should punch him in the gut.
If you're into sensitive indie rock like Belle and Sebastian or well-produced and well-orchestrated stuff like "Pet Sounds"-era Beach Boys, this album is right up your alley. I can see audiophiles all over the place perking their ears up as this CD plays out, almost wishing they could hear the grooves of the well-worn vinyl through their stylus but instead being disappointed that recordings this well-crafted are on a compact disc format.
But for us normal listeners, we'll just sit here and wonder "how in the hell did this band open on the Saves The Day tour last fall and not just get murdered by their fans?"
REAL AUDIO
Meet Me By The Water