Pants Yell!
Received Pronunciation
Rating: 3.0/5.0
Label: Slumberland
Do they jangle or shimmer? Are they charming or breezy? Answers to such questions make all the difference in a Pants Yell! dissertation. The band comes with no sharp edges, no controversy to speak of, no depths of meaning to explore or metaphor to interpret. Received Pronunciation, the Cambridge, MA trio’s fourth and reportedly final full-length, is as straight-up as the prestigious dialect to which it refers. What saves the album from irrelevance is pitch-perfect execution; it’s a concise, archetypal indie-pop record that jangles along equally with the recent work of even their best predecessors, from the Lucksmiths to Belle & Sebastian.
The stripped-down Received Pronunciation finds Pants Yell! considerably less ambitious than last year’s Alison Statton. String and brass arrangements are all but gone, though never missed. These traditional pop compositions remain pleasantly dense, grounded by full bass and Andrew Churchman’s wistful vocals. Lyrically they’re built from the bits of everyday life: the quiet morning after a party (“Frank and Sandy”), a tense disagreement between rivals (“Not Wrong”), the subtle minutia of a trip abroad (“Rue de la Paix”). Though too generic to inspire more than a passing interest, it’s clever enough to hold your attention for 26 minutes. Brevity is sometimes a virtue.
Divided neatly in half by an odd arachnid interlude, Received Pronunciation hits full stride early in its second act with the excellent “Someone Loves You.” Tireless crashing cymbal and bustling drums ride a lively bass line while Churchman lingers on his vowels just long enough to create rich contrast. “You can tell by his shoes/ Your boyfriend’s an asshole,” he rails, consoling a friend in her troubled relationship and riffing on an age-old indie stereotype. That’s about as deep as this one gets.
Any of Received Pronunciation’s eight pop songs can be summarized by this same shortlist of adjectives. Sure it gets quieter, as in the languishing, half-speed cordiality of opener “Frank and Sandy.” Louder too; “Marble Staircase” edges beyond mid-tempo with a punchy guitar melody and more thick percussion. These outliers protect the record from an otherwise sure fate of indistinguishable sameness, but still fall safely in the bounds of traditional jangle-pop.
With the faithful iteration of a formula that finds roots as far back as the Smiths and NME’s C86 compilation, Pants Yell! aren’t about to win any converts to the genre. They will, however, satisfy the disenfranchised Lucksmith fan in search of a new shimmering shtick. Endlessly comfortable in its own skin, Received Pronunciation eschews experiment, executing its particular brand of indie pop with near flawless efficiency.
by Brady Baker
