Pinback – Information Retrieved

<img src="http://www.qromag.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/11/pinbackinformationretrieved.jpg" alt="Pinback : Information Retrieved" /><br />Rarely an album has such a long, unusual gestation....
7.5 Temporary Residence
2012 

Pinback : Information Retrieved Rarely an album has such a long, unusual gestation.  Zach Smith and Rob Crow (QRO solo live review), who have been extremely busy with their side projects since the 2007’s fabulous Autumn of the Seraph (QRO review), first announced that they were working on a new album in April 2009.  Last year they then released two album tasters in the form of 7” EP’s (Information Retrieved Pt A on Record Store Day, and Information Retrieved Pt B on Black Friday) and finally over the last couple of months they made the album’s first two singles available for streaming on Rolling Stone and Pitchfork.  Long gestations never make you hope for good results, but luckily that’s never the case with Pinback and their dreamy, sophisticated pop.

Their sound hasn’t changed much but they’ve managed to keep it interesting: Crow’s clean guitar riffs, Smith’s lean bass, the layered melodies that build up slowly, the melancholic vocal harmonies that contrast yet complete the joyful rhythms, the ornate arrangements… the same effective old formula is still there and somehow Information Retrieved sounds like a summation of Pinback’s career, featuring the more polished sound of later records as well as the bittersweetness of the early material.

Thematically, the album is a struggle between light and dark, the inner and outer space, constantly shifting from gloomy feelings of mistrust and isolation to optimism and hope.  There is still that ambivalence between happiness and melancholy exuding in both their music and lyrics.  And even a stronger air of mystery that infuses the whole album, reflecting in the artwork as well: Daniel Danger’s haunting drawings of vintage telephones, radios, zoetropes, 8mm film’s strops and newspaper clippings seem to be there to invite us to solve a puzzle.

The album opens with the beautiful “Proceed To Memory”, which in spite of the twinkly guitar riffs and uplifting bass lines is a song about mortality: “Soon all you’ll have is your memory / And then you won’t even have that memory”.  Follow the jangly “Glide” and “Drawstring”, which opens with a dramatic piano accompanied by slightly palm-muted guitar before Crow sings, “I might fall / I might breakdown”.

In the funky “Sherman”, Smith and Crow’s vocals duet shadowed by glossy keyboards and textured guitar and bass lines.  New single “His Phase” features lazy, up-tempo hooks before the expansive ballad “Diminished” slows things down, showcasing jazzy piano melodies, crashing drums and rumbling bass.

With its low strings and palm-muted riffs, “True North” is another ballad about trying to move forward while “chasing death” and “changing the time zones, confusing the true north”.  The exquisitely Southern-rock-esque “A Request” and the stammering “Denslow You Idiot” are next, before the warm pianos and laid-back guitar of the sumptuous “Sediment” close the album.

Pinback – Proceed To Memory

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