In Stores Now: Evening Tapestry by Brown Recluse

Illustration from the manual for the Atari Fire Truck arcade game, 1978

The direct progeny of the Left Banke are few and precious, but the identifiers used for them can be difficult to define - "Baroque pop"? "Pastoral"? I'm not sure what makes a band baroque-pop beyond making me think, "Gee, there hasn't been a new Ladybug Transistor album in a while!" And that was my thought when I heard the debut album by Philadelphia band Brown Recluse (formerly Brown Recluse Sings), whose new album on Slumberland has been overshadowed a bit by more high-profile releases. It's worth keeping an eye out for, though, even if the Ladybug Transistor comparison isn't perfect. Brown Recluse is a little more in line with the Ladybug Transistor's earthier cousin, the much-missed Essex Green.

The songs on Evening Tapestry have organs, tasteful horns, pattering drums, and harpsichords, mixing urban and nature themes with a surprisingly morbid bent (especially in lyrics like, "The shadows of dark clouds above, threatening to eviscerate themselves all over me and drown me indiscriminately on this filthy block.") The music is consistently well-crafted and unassuming almost to a fault, but the melodies are catchy and the band approaches the baroque-pop sound from a few interesting angles, like the hazy psychedelia of "Paisley Tears" and the moody, reverb-drenched "At Last". A few of the songs have melodies that are so familiar that I automatically grind my mental gears, trying to identify the connection, but this kind of pop record does better sticking with simple tunes anyway.

One of my favorite tracks on the record is "Impressions of a City Morning", with its chugging rhythm and lilting melody line. I'll admit, though, that my ardor for this record waned a little when I got the news that the Ladybug Transistor finally have a new record coming out this spring. It seems funny to point to one band as an imitator when you're dealing with a whole genre of imitators, though - when it comes down to it, if a band can do this kind of winsome pop well, more power to them.

"Impressions of a City Morning" by Brown Recluse