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The Days and Nights of Everything Anywhere

31 Knots
Polyvinyl Records

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31 Knots - The Days and Nights of Everything Anywhere There's a reason the average listener shies away from conceptual or experimental albums. They're not just intimidating -- they're downright difficult to listen to at times. As fetching as an abstract concept or at-the-cusp musical progress can be if you're ready to devote the brainpower to deciphering their mysteries or putting them into context, sometimes you just want to kick back and enjoy a good song.

31 Knots' The Days and Nights of Everything Anywhere has all the concept (it's a tribute to information overload in the Wireless Age) and the experimental touches (the act's angular art rock expands to mess with cabaret flavors and an upped reliance on orchestration) to make it a conceptual head-scratcher for anyone with the need and/or time on his or her hands to untie 31 Knots' heady arrangements. The band also has something else nearly all of its conceptu-sperimental compatriots don't: an ear for songcraft. Like, ordinary, run-of-the-mill songcraft.

That's enough to help The Days and Nights make a shift away from being a college-rock pastime to more conventional (read: less demanding) listening habits. "Beauty" opens the album with a piano-pounding lead that covers D.C.-styled post-rock experiments with a coating of Jerry Lee Lewis accessibility. "Man Become Me" and "The Days and Nights of Lust and Presumption" channel post-hardcore's most angular guitar figures not to terrorize listeners' ears, but in pursuit of twisted pop that checks the sensibilities, if not sounds, of everyone from Brianiac to The Dismemberment Plan, as 31 Knots wrestles art-rock oddities into straightforward arrangements. "Sanctify" unleashes the band's more experimental edge, sounding like a cabaret performance starring a few Tom Waits aficionados, a mad scientist and the creepiest weirdo to climb out of the indie-rock underground in years. Even at the act's most esoteric, the atmospheric drones-meets toy pianos tune "Everything in Letters," is an easygoing lullaby.

Underneath it all, though, 31 Knots is still as brainy and arty as before. Obsessing over information over-choice, The Days and Nights is a real-world alternative to Radiohead's dismal and dehumanized world of OK Computer, where we're more likely to get caught in an informational logjam than eaten up in a robot-like bureaucracy. Although the band's lyrics lean heavily toward the impressionistic end of the spectrum, The Days and Nights finds its protagonists sorting out decidedly information-age problems: "Pulse of a Decimal" tackles the notion of absolute truth in a world with a million voices, "Beauty" tackles the same problems with personal identity.

The Days and Nights of Everything Anywhere's adventurous as anything in 31 Knots' back catalog, but this time around, the trio doesn't need to advertise its lofty ambitions. They're there, though (you don't really need to hunt too hard) 31 Knots may prove to be the most accessible art-minded act you've heard in a long, long time.

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(2 comments)

Rating:
douche... it's 31knots, no space. know it, son!
posted by joe on Mar 25, 2007

Rating:
Okay, first off: this is NOT a concept album. There may be an overall attitude and a few recurring themes, but that simply doesn't make it a concept album any more than other albums. The songs on this album are the most accomplished, most challenging, yet catchiest that 31knots have ever produced. It takes a few listens to acclimate yourself to what the band is doing this time around, which only makes the songs more rewarding in the long run. This is truly a phenomenal listen, and one I'll be wading deeper into for years to come.
posted by jojo on Mar 07, 2007

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The Days and Nights of Everything Anywhere

31 Knots Polyvinyl Records

31 Knots
Polyvinyl Records