“What will the future bring? I can’t even wake up early in the morning…” That’s pretty much the way I feel during this (and every) finals week, wondering how, over the course of the last 15 weeks, things get to this point. The answer is, they just do (”they just do”= music + booze), and Head of Femur know this. That line is from “Isn’t It a Shame?” the closing track on their stellar recent release, Great Plains. The rest of the record is filled with a sound that is actually stripped down from their last record (could you go any bigger than Hysterical Stars?)yet still manages to convey the epic space–both internal and physically real–of their midwestern subject matter. It’s a rock/pop/prog exercise in representing the features of a featureless landscape; in short, it’s what we do everyday, set to music.
If you don’t know anything about HoF, here’s the scoop. They were Nebraskans transplantedto Chicago by the fall of 2001, and soon the trio of Mike Elsener, Ben Armstrong and Matt Focht had some songs on their hands. They end up signed to Greyday for their dubut, and end up on SpinART for their sophomore effort, the aforementioned Hysterical Stars. In the meantime they are touring with a gazillion people, Polyphonic Spree-style, with harps and bajos and who knows what else. The sounds, of course, are killer, and they take to road with my some of my favorite bands, like Arhcitecture in Helsinki and Andrew Bird.
And now, dear reader, they are passed along to us. “Stripped down” to a “more manageable” five piece (this is seriously what people are writing. Do you understand yet how HUGE this band’s sound is?), they take the stage at ICYC this Sunday with Des Moines’ Poison Control Center and Heavenly States. You’ll be there if you know what’s good fer you.
Download: Head of Femur - Climbing Up Fire Escapes
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