Twin Tigers Ride Gray Waves

I don't know a lot about the Twin Tigers except to say that 1) they LOVE distortion and 2) I can just about understand anything they're singing about. Stuck in some sort of post-shoegazing comedown, Twin Tigers sound like the Verve would have in 1992 if they were on heavy sedation. Lazy and lost, Twin Tigers, are space cadets to the nth degree and judging by their curiously named album, Gray Waves, they have no desire to come back to earth in any way, shape, or form.

Gray Waves is an intriguing release not because it's overly great but because it's so wrapped up in this distorted cloud of noise that at times it's almost hard to find the songs amongst the riffage. The songs that we seek are in there but they take effort to find and one would suspect with just a little bit less haze and a bit more sheen, Gray Waves would shine like a diamond. The hooks and interesting bits are hidden amongst the cascading guitars and once they're found Gray Waves is good, but it's the constant searching and looking for them that takes a bit of effort. As it stands though, much of Gray Waves plays out like a series of broken transmissions received on earth from the outer reaches of the galaxy. The songs seem to sound as if they've been rebounding off satellites for decades and have only now found their way to Earth.

In a word Gray Waves is really about patience. Clearly Twin Tigers can write good songs, it's just that they can be a bit to chaotic to hold your interest (unless you share a profound love of the guitar and lots and lots of pedal effects). So, if you can wait for the songs to peel themselves and expose themselves to your ears, you'll find this record quite a listen. If you seek instant pop thrills this record might just give you a tripped out headache and then a distorted hangover for god measure. Twin Tigers with a bit of a spit and shine could take their flood of noise and turn it into some sort of post Interpol kind of thing and rocket to stardom; they certainly are moody enough and they almost have the songs to match.

That being said I half enjoyed this surge of noise and seemingly drugged out paranoia. I honestly hope that some degree of production is applied to these guys in the future because with just a wee bit of something this band could explode into something bigger than they could dream of.