College/Art Rock: The Speaking Canaries' Get Out Alive: The Last Type Story

I got behind on my list of CDs I want to review. In fact, I’m always behind. There’s so much great music out there to talk about, so sometimes even great CDs keep getting stuck in the To Do pile. That’s the case with the Speaking Canaries’ Get Out Alive: The Last Type Story. There’s no other reason to have passed up this album, because I have loved the Art Rock (heavy on the rock) CD since it first arrived.

Released in 2003, Damon Che’s project has the ferocity of the Smashing Pumpkins (Gish) while never being entirely straight-forward rock. This is Art Rock, blending atmospherics, indie sensibilities, and an appreciation of noise and non-standard composition techniques. Yet, the stand out track “Menopause Diaries” has a somewhat hushed-voice chorus as if from Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation, but the guitar licks and fills are strikingly similar to Eddie Van Halen’s chord-walking. This isn’t pretentious Art Rock which can’t seem to understand that it builds on the shoulders and riffs of giants; this is Art Rock with Classic Rock taste.

With the fingerboard chiming, “Coffin Jitters” begins by lulling you into a melancholy, but it bangs you out reverie with guitar onslaught like an alarm clock that wakes you up loudly but immediately has you tapping out the rhythm with your toes under the covers. “Last Side of Town Pt. 2” could be a simple, throw away rocker in the hands of some punks, but there’s beauty here even as the song reaches the half-tempo bridge, the full breakdown, and the yelled “whoa” which sends the track flying to the end with more Van Halen pyrotechnics. (The “whoa” is distorted on purpose?).

“Song on a Record You Can’t Get” and “Theme From Hospital Comedian” mainly feature a solo Che on electric guitar. It’s like listening to a friend play extended doodlings in a college dorm room, realizing that what began as hunt-and-pecking has become a very intense jam.

Then the Neanderthal frat boy from next door comes in drinking his fifth cheap beer for the evening. Not sensing that our hero has achieved Art Rock-dom, the frat guy says, “What is that?!? Don’t you know something like ‘Stairway to Heaven’”? Obligingly, our hero switches to the rock standard.

Amazed, the Neanderthal is enthralled, and 10 minutes later when our hero completes the song, the frat boy says, “Whoa, dude! When did Jimmy Page ever play that version?”

Our hero responds, “He didn’t. I stopped playing ‘Stairway’ five minutes ago.” It doesn’t matter whether the Neanderthal gets it or not. You realize that your friend, our hero, has just exacted a most awe-inspiring jam which had its beginnings in some recognizable Classic Rock chords but soon gave way to something completely new, ready to speak its own voice into rock history.

That is what listening to tracks 7 and 8 is like. I don’t have a dorm room, but Damon Che and the Speaking Canaries are welcome to play in my garage anytime.

Thanks to the Speaking Canaries and Scat Records. Get Out Alive is distributed by Revolver USA.