13 January 2011

Chauchat - songs for scaffolding (2009, Unread / Monototone Tapes)

Eighth album already for Tyler Whitney's project, here teaming with Erik Sahd, recorded during summer 2009 in an old candy factory located in his hometown of Lancaster, PA.

When you've got a trajectory of more than ten years and a strong personal artistic integrity, you can't really deviate, just develop more control to your songwriting, put behind you your lo-fi years and sound more professionally indie.



"Songs for scaffolding" is a quintessential American indie record in the way that he summarizes through his own coherence, the ins and outs of a 25 years long history, from The Clean to Pavement, from Sonic Youth to Galaxie 500, from Bright Eyes to the Red House Painters. Not as a reader's digest or as a purist, but with a personal perspective for Tyler Whitney, as strong as a rock with a faultless style even if he never explores new grounds.

Eleven songs and none to reject even if I have no particular crush for one or another, a feeling that I used to have on his previous records, with always the certainty to find a few important gems. It's not the case here but Tyler isn't losing himself, he just plows more deeper with more persuasion and mastery his own native musical grounds, exchanging this with the loss of a part of his previous hesitation, fragility and intimacy as inevitable corollary.

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