DEAD MEADOW
Feathers (Matador Records)
Reviewed by Holly Day

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Just imagine: You're sixteen, and it's the first day of summer vacation.You and your buddies pack up a pile of towels and suntan lotion and your cassette player and head out to the lake for the day. The sun is blistering hot, and still you manage to down the warm beer surreptitiously smuggled in the stinky trunk of someone's car, and, as you lie there in the sun, you can feel every single tiny spot on your body that didn't get enough sunscreen slathered on. You can actually feel the skin puckering and curling up in the first stages of sunburn, but it feels so good to be outside in the middle of the day you just don't care. Having a hard time imagining/remembering? Try putting on this album and see if that helps. If you're old enough that space rock guitar jams, heavy, driving bass lines, and melancholy, oddly-pitched voices that almost get lost in the musical mix make you think of salty snacks and incense burning, then that's what this record will do for you. Younger listeners, of course, will probably just think this sounds really, really cool.

© 2005 - Holly Day