Music
Press
Contitnental Divide is a four piece from Destin, Florida that loves keyboards and bells. I've also recently discovered that I love them and that they're extremely promising and if they really wanted to, they could probably take the blogosphere by storm. Yeah, I said it. Blogosphere blogosphere blogosphere. This track will be appearing on an unsigned band compilation released by Velvet Blue Music which is home to Richard Swift, Denison Witmer, and Starflyer 59. If these guys continue at the pace they're going, I can't see them being unsigned for very much longer.
[MP3]: Continental Divide :: The Days Drag, But He's Old (Listen Now!!!)
If you were wondering why the elipses is there, it's not because it's part of the title. It's there because the fulltitle of the song was cut off on their MySpace, which is their only home on the internet. About the song though, it's awesome! I mean, I use enough hyperbole as it is, so what's a little more, right? In all seriousness though, this song sounds a bit like the result of The Strokes singing some unwritten Wolf Parade song. In fact, it's got a real "Wolf Parade's first two EPs" sound to it, what with the drum explosions, buzzing keyboards, and those sweet sweet bells. With the right production, these songs could be even better than they already are. Keep your eyes fixed on these guys in the coming year.
- blownbythewind.blogspot.com
Quietly into friday
Continental Divide - "The Days Fade, But He's Old".
Sometimes I record music. Or at least I've been known to. Just silly little things, sometimes with a few friends but often just me toying with GarageBand in my room at 2am, yelling into my iBook's internal microphone. I love to have my headphones on, something playing, and me just singing for myself, yelling fuzzy, slipping off the beat, too loud or too quiet, like wine sloshing in a glass.
The boy at the head of Continental Divide sings in just this way; there's an organ that sounds like Sunset Rubdown's, drums surprisingly taut, but the greatest satisfaction is in the vocals' slip and buzz. The way it's so amateur it feels hand-sewn: a voice that knits knots. - saidthegramophone.com
Thick with reverb, swirling Rhodes piano and a chorus of distorted bells, Continental Divide's Golden Throats is a shabby collection of five imperfect songs—which isn't meant as a slight. The album's charm lies as much in the music as its visible seams.
Most songs begin with Nathan Pemberton's hesitant vocals echoing over simple progressions on guitar or piano. His voice is the most prominent instrument, and though it may sound unpolished—and occasionally atonal—it's hard to deny a palpable underlying sincerity. Songs vacillate between hushed verses and explosive crescendos, often dissolving into a cloud of analog dissonance. But underneath all of the distortion and clatter are elegant melodies. The dichotomy draws easy comparisons to artists like Phil Elvrum of the Microphones/Mount Eerie or Neutral Milk Hotel. While comparable, the music is far from derivative.
Continental Divide is comprised solely of Pemberton, a Florida-native who plays all instruments on the record and employs a transient assortment of musicians for live performances. In recent months they have shared the stage with the likes of Man Man, the Walkmen and Black Kids. Completely self-released, Golden Throats comes in handmade packaging, cobbled together as shabbily as the music itself. You can buy Golden Throats for $7.50 on Insound. - Doug Black
His rough production, weary voice, and smart pop sensibilities create a captivating and charming sound.
The EP Golden Throats has a homemade quality that brings to mind Phil Elvrum of the Microphones/Mt. Eerie. The track "All Minor Holidays" is a solemn tune that features reverb layered vocals and harmonium swells." - NPR
"8th Best Song of the Year. A whole album of this would be amazing" - http://skatterbrain.org/2006/12/skatterbrains-top-songs-of-year.html
Discography
"Golden Throats" EP (Self-released, 2008)
"Empty books, open dressers, and loud rooms." EP
(Self-released, 2006)
Photos
Bio
Continental Divide's music is chasms. Singing and echoing through and across the distance between quick turns of phrase and densely laid guitars and synthesizers, Nathan Pemberton weaves into Golden Throats stories familiar with emotion and distant with metaphor and allusion. Four Scenes opens the EP with Pemberton's vocals echoing easily against a simple guitar melody that builds to include crashing drums and running glockenspiels. The ease of the vocal delivery carries throughout each song, but that ease is not for lack of effort or concern in Pemberton's voice. Indeed, admitting one's parents are shadows and pining to be forgotten are not conclusions easily gathered, but Continental Divide is content with allowing the implicit emotion of their lyrics to be filled by the force of crashing guitars and airy keyboards. The title track Golden Throat delivers on the promise of its surrounding numbers by employing the single-voice-single-instrument-building-to-the-brink-of-disarray structure used throughout the EP. Pemberton's reverb-laden vocals keep the song from becoming too danceable or recognizably poppy as they fade in and out. The phrases seem to echo through a dense cloud of instruments building and collapsing onto and into one another, suspended like memories just beyond the brink of recognition. The desire for recognition surfaces again and again in the both lyrics and musicality in these songs as Nathan Pemberton yelps and groans and sings across the void of memory and emotion and loss and relationships. Continental Divide's music is chasms, but they are chasms filled to the brink.
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