Americans

TIME OUT NEW YORK (Starred Show Pick)
“No-Frills Brooklyn band Americans plays the kind of desperate, disaffected indie rock that sounds at once robotic and visceral.”

THE NEW YORK POST, (Maryt Huhn, Playlist, show pick)
“Mr. Yee's First Annual Memorial Day Party hits the Mercury Lounge with local acts Americans, Aloke, Right on Dynamite and Stay Fucked. According to Americans’ Andrieu Richards, his band started the semi-regular event, Mr. Yee's Secret Opium Party, in the basement of a Chinatown restaurant over a year ago, drawing overflowing crowds through word of mouth--and no help from Playlist. Too much for the basement, that event has since moved to Northsix. The Americans, compelled to play on Memorial Day, will focus on music reflecting "living in New York in such a confusing period.”

THE DELI (Show Pick)
“The Americans (the band not the peoples) started Mr. Yee’s Secret Opium Party in October 2004. Yee Parties have since been propelled by popularity to venues larger than a Chinatown basement. This Memorial Day, the Americans are launching what they are planning to be a long tradition of Memorial Day Parties at the Mercury Lounge...there couldn’t possibly be a better way for your sun-spoiled barbeque-stuffed self the spend the evening of Memorial Day...”

COMMONTALES.ORG (show review, NorthSix 3/29/06)
“We're Americans and we're sick of war.”
The Achilles' Heel of politically aware music is that it often puts message before pleasure. Some political bands have become very popular, and deservedly so, but even the ones I like tire me out after a while. Dead Kennedys for one. Great band, wonderful songs, fascinating front man. But in the end an angry monotone. Public Enemy is another. They’re one of the greatest hip-hop bands of all time, and It Takes a Nation Of Millions to Hold Us Back is one of the great albums of all time. But they're not getting a summer radio marathon anytime soon.
This is where Americans are different. I don't want to label them 'pop,' or to call them a party band, but quoting American Bandstand on them, “It’s got a great beat that you can really dance to” is pretty damn accurate.
The first song started on a casual, jangly trot, but with sharp spurs for lyrics. They’re describing how we all live right now. This is our experience in plain clothes, not intellectual preening. The song acknowledged that yeah, what's going on isn't right and we all feel it— but at least we're all feeling it together. It’s validating to hear it spoken through a mic, and we give ourselves power by singing along.
Political lyrics point out social ills, persuade with anger and resentment, and then call for destruction. But Americans’ great skill is that they present life as it is, ugly and unjust, but then move the focus to how it could—and can— be. I looked at Emily next to me. Invite an old friend somewhere new and you're bound to worry if they're having a good time. At least I am. It's another thing Emily and I share, so a look was enough to ask how she was doing. She looked back with her question: Are you feeling this?
The last song came up and we had all been smiling and dancing, feeling good about who we were and glad to be together. Andrieu spoke up: "Sing along at the end of this one if you want to." And back to sure-handed guitars and drums, group dancing and shared enthusiasm. The final chorus came and he spoke it, then sang it, and repeated it as a shout verging on a scream: War! Is! Over!
What relief! I wanted to feel it. I joined in. Not loud, but I was speaking. Emily couldn't hear me, but I could. War! Is! Over!
I scanned the people in the room—acting it, singing it, dancing it — and saw them remember who they were back then. I watched them feel good again about their ideas, their hopes and talents, and their American lives.”
- Time Out, NY Post, The Deli