Album Of The Week: August 4th-10th, 2014

Flatbasset Radio's Album Of The Week for the week of August 4th-10th, 2014:

Frankie Teardrop - Raiders

01. Raiders
02. 100%
03. No More Drugs
04. She Kept Lyin
05. Personal Hell
06. It Takes Time

This is Frankie Teardrop's second time appearing here as an AOTW.  Back in November of 2013 I spent a week with his debut EP Tough Guy.  Back then I wrote that I couldn't tell if the songs were "garage rock songs polished up or pop songs stripped down."  While that's still the case with Raiders, it's becoming clear that Frankie's pop-rock heart beats strong & clear.

Raiders shows a welcome amount of growth from an artist who's last record contained songs like "Pizza Lyfestyle" and "New Beverage."  The record's opening one-two punch of "Raiders" & "100%," stands as the best two songs Frankie's written to date (if you're a fan of the Flatbasset Radio podcast you might remember us opening with "Raiders" a few weeks back).  Both are energetic, catchy, & poppy and benefit greatly from the addition of a second guitarist.  Lyrically, however, they start hinting at some of the darker subject matter to come.

Flatbasset Radio: Episode #39 by Tcdroogsma on Mixcloud

As you can probably imagine just from the titles of the last four tracks, Frankie's songwriting has taken a turn for the personal (though I'm willing to bet "Pizza Lyfestyle" was personal in its own way).  The band is young enough that emotional turmoil of the second half of the album rings clear.  For example, "She Kept Lyin" is not an angry, detached dig at said liar as much as it is an explanation of mood.  The record ends on relatively positive note with "It Takes Time," which finds Frankie showing the maturity to understand that, well, things take time.

My friend Adam recently described Frankie Teardrop as "Bauhaus covering the Beach Boys," which nails their sound pretty well.  I finally caught these guys a couple of weeks back at the 10,000 Sounds Festival and I can attest to the "you really have to see them live" reputation that they've earned.  The band's trajectory from Tough Guy to Raiders is an encouraging one and I'm excited to see where these guys go next.  Until then, really, you should see them live.

Raiders was self-released by Frankie Teardrop on his brand new No Problem Records.  If you'd like to check it out for yourself head over to the Bandcamp site where the record's available as a "Name Your Price" download.

Album Of The Week : November 25-December 1, 2013

My Album Of The Week for the week of November 25th-December 1st, 2013:

Frankie Teardrop - Tough Guy

A couple of things led to me spending the week with "Tough Guy."  First, I was reading Erik Thompsons's excellent Gimme Noise column 10 Twin Cities Music Acts Who Deserve To Be Famous and, continuing the Sisyphian struggle that is keeping up with the Twin Cities music scene, I downloaded whatever albums I could find from the artists in the column.

While all of those albums will likely find their way to Album Of The Week status, Frankie Teardrop jumped to the front of the line when his song "Chicago" was one of the Song Of The Day tracks (meaning I'd be spending the week with it anyway and reviewing it for Songs Of The Week).  Rather than spend two weeks with "Chicago" I decided to kill two birds with one stone and just make Tough Guy my album of the week.

After a couple of spins I can't totally tell if the songs of Tough Guy are garage rock songs polished up or pop songs stripped down.  More important than that, though, is that the record is fun.  Late November is the time of the year when the Twin Cities stops being fun and starts being a city of "serious artists."  Listening to an album that ends with a song called "Pizza Lyfestyle" is a nice way to combat that creeping pretension.

Tough Guy is available as a name-your-price download on Frankie Teardrop's Bandcamp page.