Soundbite: No Age
By Ross Rinehart
May 5, 2008 9:31 p.m.
Taking a cue from the economy of their songwriting, I’m going to distill this Soundbite into all that you really need to know about No Age’s “Nouns”: It slays, and you need it. That’s all. Go get it.
If you, the loyal Bruin reader, are still around, here’s the real review: Whether they appreciate the designation, No Age has come to personify the new wave of L.A. punk bands rooted in the 1980s hard core of Black Flag and X. The duo of Dean Spunt (drums and vocals) and Randy Randall (guitar) take the skronk and fuzz of early Sonic Youth and filter it through the fractured lens of a hard-core band, serving up a primitive but immediately appealing mold of indie-punk.
The legions of folks walking around in the multihued “NO AGE” block-lettered T-shirts certainly lend credence to the band’s mass-conquering capabilities. After two years of extensive touring, limitless shows in the greater Los Angeles area and a continuous stream of singles and EPs (most of which are collected on last year’s “Weirdo Rippers”), No Age has clearly put in serious legwork to become the L.A. buzz-band ““ they even helped install the second bathroom of downtown hole-in-the-wall venue The Smell, home court to No Age and the experimental punk and hard-core scene they currently embody.
But with an endless barrage of reductive music journalists (myself not withstanding) willing to place the entire L.A. music scene on Spunt and Randall’s shoulders, there was serious risk their proper debut would wind up a trepid, affected statement of a band not willing or ready to be critic-anointed poster boys. What a relief it is that “Nouns” is a confident and assured statement that is fully realized, seemingly nonchalant and endlessly fun and addictive.
On opening track “Miner,” Spunt impatiently taps on a tambourine, waiting for Randall to wake his guitars up from murky feedback haze, before launching into a punishing 90-second effects-and-sample-laden assault. Save for the palette-cleansing ambient wash of “Keechie” and “Impossible Bouquet” at the album’s midpoint, No Age refuses to relinquish this energy, serving up 12 head-bashingly triumphant blasts of art-punk noise and rhythms in just a hair over 30 minutes. But what makes No Age so gratifying and accessible is that beneath the layers of Sturm und Drang is a nucleus of melodic pop songs and sing-along chants. Whereas “Weirdo Rippers” was largely divided between incendiary anthems and noisy, amorphous soundscapes (The A-sides/B-sides nature of a singles compilation certainly contributed to this.), “Nouns” goes straight for the pop-jugular with a slew of single-ready material. The opening riff of “Eraser” is downright sprightly before giving way to the satisfying crunch of Randall’s layered guitars and Spunt’s muffled verses. The chain saw buzz and snare-heavy beat of “Cappo” is interspersed with some of the catchiest guitar work Randall has yet to put to tape. And album standout “Sleeper Hold” already is gaining deservingly hyperbolic blog-praise as a contender for song of the year, its anthemic feedback squalls somehow growing more lifting with each listen.
No Age’s debut could wind up a moment of ephemeral brilliance in the vein of Interpol’s “Turn On the Bright Lights” or The Rapture’s “Echoes”: auspicious debuts that neatly encapsulate fledging music scenes, but ultimately a flash-in-the-pan moment of near perfection the bands have since struggled to recapture. But with “Weirdo Rippers” serving as a touch-off point and “Nouns” as the perfection of that potential, No Age is realizing its capabilities, finding its voice and ripping any naysayer to shreds, one blistering two-minute gem at a time.
““ Ross Rinehart
E-mail Rinehart at [email protected].
