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Akron/Family | Live Review
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The Fulcrum Magazine Ottawa, Canada | Travis Boisvenue All in the Akron/FamilyOctober 06Akron/Family played at the First Baptist Church on Friday, Oct. 6, 2006. All nine million fans loved it. Just look at them, throwing up their hands in rapture. Photos by Jason Chiu.AKRON/FAMILY DEMONSTRATED their dominance over the format of live rock music on Oct. 6, and First Baptist church proved itself to be the most relevant music venue in Ottawa.The band showed up for their soundcheck nearly two hours late, citing construction and traffic as their alibi. The band was surprisingly friendly and apologetic for four guys who just drove six hours in a cramped van. All was forgiven, and the Fulcrum crew helped them carry their equipment into the church. Bassist Miles Seaton walked into the church and marveled at the stained glass windows, saying, "Wow! Are those space scenes?" The bands lyrics focus on God, space, and love. The cosmic imagery on the church windows was to be the first of many idiosyncrasies that night.The four members of Akron/Family started their performance by sitting on the stairs of the altar. They encouraged people to sit on the carpet with them as they led us in a steady chant......
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Akron/Family | Review
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www.treblezine.com | Jeff Terich the band has attacked with their entire arsenal and knocks the listener out with a feather10.02.2006Meek WarriorYoung God 2006 Akron/Family is one of the few bands today that makes as concerted an effort as possible to make their live show a completely different entity from their recorded output. Their debut record, though occasionally marked by experimentation and improvisation, was a gorgeous and melodic affair with any real freakishness contained within neatly wrapped melodies. Seeing the Brooklyn four-piece perform, however, often involves howling, handclapping, lots of percussion, twenty-minute jams, campfire singalongs, primal screams, jumping, circling, noise, solos, rocking out, white noise, and sections of recognizable melodies in between. It's not that they don't play songs off of their records, because they do. It's just that what actually made it to your stereo isn't necessarily the definitive version, and they're going to have a little fun with it. This could all change with the band's latest album, Meek Warrior, the proper follow-up to their self-titled debut. Although even the press release states that this is a "special" album, somehow indicating that it's some kind of separate mini release. Having only seven tracks, it takes up just as much......
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Akron/Family | Review
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www.blogsandiego.com This record goes into our best of the year pile.10.02.06Meek WarriorYoung God Records The pleasure and battering of the all-lovely Meek Warrior starts out on "Blessing Force". This song has a little bit of most of the Akron/Family flavor. Welcoming you to their sacred party, they introduce you to their blessing force. From simple, intense, mind tilting dissonance, to a lovely in the room sing along with claps, to a solid all together jam, into a break of Japan sounds that repeat until you're hypnotized, unaware, maybe unprepared if you don't know the band. This is all in the first 4 minutes of the disc. And then, get ready for your head to explode. Prepare yourself, you have moments to breathe before the all lovely feedback squelch, Acid Mothers Temple interuptus which encompasses you and their entire beings. Feel it, relent, relent. Because into the darkness of a storm lies a wonderful simple piece that will soothe you as you continue your journey down the yellow brick road to Oz with these fellas. It's no longer a quiet then step on a pedal noise thing. Now it's done with complete structure and insanity. Balanced between a perfect tightrope walk of......
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Lisa Germano | Review
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www.pitchforkmedia.com | David RaposaShe can unearth the darkness in the most innocuous scenesOctober 05, 2006In the Maybe World[Young God Records; 2006]Rating: 7.5 As if there was any doubt who Lisa Germano is singing to, she sets the record straight on "Too Much Space", the second track of In the Maybe World. After effortlessly painting a portrait of a jilted lover ("An illusion; it's just not true/ We've always been me and you"), she ends the track on a repeated refrain--one of us, one of us. Most folks will recognize that line from the movie Freaks, a twisted love story that turns into a tale of revenge set amongst a carnival freak show. The circus freaks--pinheads, hermaphrodites, an inchworm-like man made up of little more than a torso and a head--use this line as a disquieting rallying cry, and it works the same way in Germano's song. It's cold comfort for those that have been there to know they're not alone, even though they are. A chorus of Germanos--breathy, exhausted--against a plainly pretty piano backdrop only adds to the unsettling mood. For Germano, this push-pull between pretty and unsettling is nothing new. Most of her songs resemble lullabies, but they're the......
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Akron/Family | Review
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Rocky Mountain Chronicle | Elliot Johnston Now, with Meek Warrior, Akron/Family seems poised for still greater heightsOct '06Meek WarriorYoung God Records During the past year, Akron/Family has been an ace in the hole for the contemporary music nerd. Even when challenged by a crabby avatar of classic rock - who won't grant genius outside of the Stones, Zeppelin or Zappa - the Family's appealing yet completely zoological exuberance has proven a bold retort. Take "Moment" and "Raising the Sparks" from last year's split with the Angles of Light: the former is stuffed with apocalyptic guitar squalls in between choral yelping and mellowed folk, and the latter builds into a tribal, psychedelic scream-out. No joke: I played "Sparks" for a friend and he fell off the arm of his couch. Now, with Meek Warrior, Akron/Family seems poised for still greater heights. The opener, "Blessing Force," clocks in at nine minutes, and for all its kooky giddiness, it feels like an under cooked cousin of "Moment." Its campfire a cappella, heavy, proggy changes and relentless, sax-blurping outro prove more messy than transcendent. The room-spinning thump of "The Rider (Dolphin Song)" is better, but the Family's formerly charming abrasions get a tad grating. The......