Disappears - Guider (Kranky)
Chicago's Disappears are one of those bands that play what I like to call record store clerk rock. I'm sure you know what I mean by that, they are a band who pillages their, admittedly, really cool record collection and turns it into the kind of "spot the influences" music that is certain to get the "HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!!!!" stamp of approval at your local indie shop. For their second record, Guider, Disappears continues to work the tried and true krautrock formula (always a big hit with the bearded clerk types) but ratchet up the intensity by shifting their focus up a few decades by swirling in the repetitive guitar attack of bands like Loop and Spacemen 3. This 30-minute record is split into two distinct halves - the first finds the band tearing through five songs in fifteen minutes, while the flipside has them locking into one tight motorik groove for the other fifteen. Running time aside, the formula remains pretty much the same throughout - steady, driving drums under tightly compressed, repeating guitar riffs and overprocessed vocals buried in the mud. Its a great sound, particularly for that final fifteen minute jam, it ends up sounding like fifteen minutes pulled from an infinite loop that is circling through some smoky suburban basement. My only complaint would be the lack of texture. Each of the six tracks, long and short alike, are cut from similar cloth with very few variations. While this makes for an intense singular experience, I can't help but think I'd return to it more often if there was a little more exploration involved. But, hey, sometimes there is something to be said for cutting through the crap and getting right to that groove. If you have and love records by Hawkwind, Spacemen 3, or Wooden Shjips, this is going to be right up your alley, even if nothing about it is wholly original.
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