Spare Snare

February 15 - 22, 1 9 9 6

*** SPARE SNARE

(Prospective/TRG)

Confusion, if done right, can be the most honest response to the chaos of the world. That is, if it doesn't take itself too seriously. When Jan Burnett mumbles "I remember something more, I can't understand I'm sure" in "Shine on Now" to a relaxed, sauntering riff, you can't help being sympathetic to the sincerity of his stumbling attempts at focus. In the surf-thrash of "Wired for Sound," the lyric "She's into denim, she's into drugs/She goes to movies, but TV sucks" plays like the soundtrack to a bohemian nation while a stiff-necked bass line wobbles forward. "Thorns" has that lazy-assed, lying-on-the-grass-and-staring-at-the-sun-sound, complete with thoughts of "how it could have been, and how it should have been/Pretty girls with pretty faces, mini-skirts and way-down laces."

So the album grooves while you get caught up in the obscurantism of the words, fuzzed-up guitars, occasional neo-funk bass lines, and off-key keyboards. Spare Snare don't move much beyond Burnett's confusion, and they don't have what you'd call a coherent sound. Maybe that's why the disc comes off as such a gorgeously chaotic amalgam of skewered pop noise. Best track: the unlikely love song "Skateboard Punk Rocker."

-- Felix Khalatnikov