Dubb Nubb

How many potential music careers wind up snuffed after a single, brutal gig? A disastrous performance at a school talent show, or that embarrassing show at the cool local coffeehouse…

Dubb Nubb, the duo otherwise known as twin sisters Hannah and Delia Rainey, have survived the ignominy of such a sad fate, playing shows at their high school, their synagogue, a series of house parties, and then that bastion of local cool, Foam. Finishing one another’s sentences and quickly adding thoughts to each other’s comments, the pair understand that they stand out from their peers at Ladue Horton Watkins High School, where they’re currently seniors.

“It’s hard to get people from our school to come to shows,” says Delia. “A lot of their parents don’t want them going down to
Cherokee Street.”

“We’re having a whole different experience than a lot of kids,” adds Hannah. “We’re going to concerts, and they’re just looking to
get drunk.”

“We can write up to two songs a week,” says Hannah. “It doesn’t take that long for us to write. Because we live together, we’re able to make the time.”

“It’s like, after three hours of homework at 11 o’clock, we’ll say, ‘It’s band rehearsal time,’” says Delia. “And it always works out.”

Comments about homework aside, when critics write about the band, they marvel over the fact that these teenage girls do not pen songs about ribbons or horseback riding. No—the Rainey twins write cheeky tunes like “Taco Vom,” which is about seeing taco throw-up on the sidewalk, perhaps on Cherokee Street, which, between Cranky Yellow, Foam and events like the Secret Sound Society musical festival, has become their prime gigging spot. In the canon of precocious musicians, you can plot them further from Brenda Lee, closer to Alex Chilton.

Last year, during their last high-school summer vacation, they hung with their older sister, Amanda, who co-runs Special Passenger Records, an indie label/collective in Mississippi. Through “Spesh Pass” (also the title of a Dubb Nubb song written in homage to the label), the band released a DIY-spirited EP, New Bones. The disc, packaged in hand-assembled fabric cases, saw release on May 22, at the twins’ 18th birthday party (for which they played a concert in their backyard, wearing foil-paper party hats).

They also formed a temporary “sistercousin garage pop band,” Teen Room—which actually performed in the Rainey basement. It featured Hannah on electric guitar (and trumpet, on one song about a dead dog), Delia on keys, and Amanda and cousin Jessica on drums. They covered Fastball—and Dubb Nubb, too.

The pair say music was always playing around the house, mostly in the form of landmark folk acts like Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan. That grounding was added to as the pair listened to a variety of upbeat local bands of recent vintage, groups like Jumbling Towers, So Many Dynamos, Berlin Whale, and others, all of whom inspired them to take the stage while still in high school. Making friends with local acts like Sleep in Sundays, We’re Wolf, and Fragile Farm cemented their desire to continue playing small gigs on a regular basis, whether at venues like Cranky Yellow and the Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center or in word-of-mouth gatherings like house shows. “There’s definitely something more intimate about house shows,” says Hannah. “We wind up meeting a lot of people.”

“There’s a big group of kids in bands now,” adds Delia. “They’re all really supportive and nice. You’ve got acoustic bands and some little electronic bands, too, noise bands.” As important, “We don’t all go to the same
high school.”

The group’s instrumentally spare sound comes primarily from the guitar of Hannah (who studied classical guitar for five years), set alongside Delia’s lyrics and vocals. With unusual phrasings (“I wish I was a boat / down highways I would sail / rolling down the road / a lonely, lovesick trail…”) and occasional bursts of Delia’s ukulele, their sound veers into a much more interesting realm than the guitar-and-voice simplicity made by young musicians at open-mic nights all around town. They’ve definitely got a nuanced sound, and they’re aware enough to explore and expand it, while staying true to their basic approach, as evidenced well by the six divergent sounds of New Bones. Ideally, the two would enjoy adding small, instrumental touches to their music, little touches of harmonica, banjo, or bass drum. But make no mistake: They’re not looking for a band.

Not even a Teen Room reunion?

“We hope to keep it just me and Delia,” says Hannah. “We’d work in other people as we need them.”
- St. Louis Magazine

How many potential music careers wind up snuffed after a single, brutal gig? A disastrous performance at a school talent show, or that embarrassing show at the cool local coffeehouse…

Dubb Nubb, the duo otherwise known as twin sisters Hannah and Delia Rainey, have survived the ignominy of such a sad fate, playing shows at their high school, their synagogue, a series of house parties, and then that bastion of local cool, Foam. Finishing one another’s sentences and quickly adding thoughts to each other’s comments, the pair understand that they stand out from their peers at Ladue Horton Watkins High School, where they’re currently seniors.

“It’s hard to get people from our school to come to shows,” says Delia. “A lot of their parents don’t want them going down to
Cherokee Street.”

“We’re having a whole different experience than a lot of kids,” adds Hannah. “We’re going to concerts, and they’re just looking to
get drunk.”

“We can write up to two songs a week,” says Hannah. “It doesn’t take that long for us to write. Because we live together, we’re able to make the time.”

“It’s like, after three hours of homework at 11 o’clock, we’ll say, ‘It’s band rehearsal time,’” says Delia. “And it always works out.”

Comments about homework aside, when critics write about the band, they marvel over the fact that these teenage girls do not pen songs about ribbons or horseback riding. No—the Rainey twins write cheeky tunes like “Taco Vom,” which is about seeing taco throw-up on the sidewalk, perhaps on Cherokee Street, which, between Cranky Yellow, Foam and events like the Secret Sound Society musical festival, has become their prime gigging spot. In the canon of precocious musicians, you can plot them further from Brenda Lee, closer to Alex Chilton.

Last year, during their last high-school summer vacation, they hung with their older sister, Amanda, who co-runs Special Passenger Records, an indie label/collective in Mississippi. Through “Spesh Pass” (also the title of a Dubb Nubb song written in homage to the label), the band released a DIY-spirited EP, New Bones. The disc, packaged in hand-assembled fabric cases, saw release on May 22, at the twins’ 18th birthday party (for which they played a concert in their backyard, wearing foil-paper party hats).

They also formed a temporary “sistercousin garage pop band,” Teen Room—which actually performed in the Rainey basement. It featured Hannah on electric guitar (and trumpet, on one song about a dead dog), Delia on keys, and Amanda and cousin Jessica on drums. They covered Fastball—and Dubb Nubb, too.

The pair say music was always playing around the house, mostly in the form of landmark folk acts like Joni Mitchell and Bob Dylan. That grounding was added to as the pair listened to a variety of upbeat local bands of recent vintage, groups like Jumbling Towers, So Many Dynamos, Berlin Whale, and others, all of whom inspired them to take the stage while still in high school. Making friends with local acts like Sleep in Sundays, We’re Wolf, and Fragile Farm cemented their desire to continue playing small gigs on a regular basis, whether at venues like Cranky Yellow and the Lemp Neighborhood Arts Center or in word-of-mouth gatherings like house shows. “There’s definitely something more intimate about house shows,” says Hannah. “We wind up meeting a lot of people.”

“There’s a big group of kids in bands now,” adds Delia. “They’re all really supportive and nice. You’ve got acoustic bands and some little electronic bands, too, noise bands.” As important, “We don’t all go to the same
high school.”

The group’s instrumentally spare sound comes primarily from the guitar of Hannah (who studied classical guitar for five years), set alongside Delia’s lyrics and vocals. With unusual phrasings (“I wish I was a boat / down highways I would sail / rolling down the road / a lonely, lovesick trail…”) and occasional bursts of Delia’s ukulele, their sound veers into a much more interesting realm than the guitar-and-voice simplicity made by young musicians at open-mic nights all around town. They’ve definitely got a nuanced sound, and they’re aware enough to explore and expand it, while staying true to their basic approach, as evidenced well by the six divergent sounds of New Bones. Ideally, the two would enjoy adding small, instrumental touches to their music, little touches of harmonica, banjo, or bass drum. But make no mistake: They’re not looking for a band.

Not even a Teen Room reunion?

“We hope to keep it just me and Delia,” says Hannah. “We’d work in other people as we need them.”
- St. Louis Magazine

You could see how it would be easy to get snared in a web of pithy statements when it comes to describing the band Dubb Nubb. Since the group is made up of a trio of sisters – Hannah, Delia and Amanda Rainey – it wouldn't take long to compose lines about how the family that plays together, stays together or how these sisters are doing it for themselves with a DIY ethos.

But to get hung up there would be to downplay the brilliant music the Raineys make. It's a folk-pop sound that evokes innocence and simplicity on first listen but, with each subsequent spin, digs around topics and themes and sonic threads that steely and substantive.

Initially just Delia and Hannah (who referred to themselves as a "twindie" band), the group first played Columbia while the pair were still in high school. Moving here to attend the University of Missouri, they integrated Amanda into the act and the three have only grown their sound and audience from there. While the trio was on a recent East Coast tour, Amanda Rainey exchanged emails with the Tribune, shedding light on the group's creative process and what it has in common with Tom Waits, of all people.

Tribune: So, let's get the obvious question out of the way: What are the best things about being a sister act and what are the worst?

Rainey: It's fun and rewarding to write music with people you love and we get to spend a lot of time together! Also people respond really well to family bands. We have a special connection and that comes out in the music! Sometimes we have those bickering moments while on tour or writing songs, but it never lasts too long.

Tribune: If I've got my chronology right, you had played at least one True/False Film Fest before officially moving to Columbia. How did forming relationships locally through the festival in any way ease that transition and help establish a fanbase here?

Rainey: Yes, the twins played True/False when they were seniors in high school, and then the Boone Dawdle when they first moved to Columbia. These two experiences helped us ease into the arts community here! It was cool to play True/False first as a St. Louis band and then as a Columbia band. We had such a closer connection to T/F and Columbia after that.

Tribune: Speaking of growing a fanbase, the band is currently on an East Coast jag. How has touring elsewhere made you appreciative of the Midwest (and, specifically, Columbia) music scene and how has it underscored things that could be done differently here?

Rainey: Touring is an incredible thing. It's exciting to play for a group of strangers when we don't know what to expect. Columbia, especially the DIY scene, is really good and giving to its touring bands, and we are proud of that and have seen this while touring as well.

Tribune: Talk a bit about what the division of labor looks like between the three of you as far as the writing and recording process goes. Additionally, you have been pretty prolific as far as putting out new recordings. Do you feel a certain urgency or compulsion to get material out in the atmosphere as soon as you can?

Rainey: For the most part, Delia writes the lyrics and melodies. Hannah will too at times, but always writes guitar parts and harmonies. They then will practice the songs with me and I will add percussion! We've put out a collection of our songs every year, recording usually during spring break. This is such a short window of time and we realize now that our recordings can seem a little rushed. We hope to spend more time with the recording process for our next album!

Tribune: Members of the band have crafted some pretty cool artwork to go along with some of these recordings. How much intentionality have you, as a band, put into creating an overall aesthetic? Do you, in any way, see the effects and influences of other art forms on your sound at all?

Rainey: We embrace the DIY way of creating music and art. We've created a lot of the album art on our own and everything else is done by close friends. The difference when, say, Delia does the art is that it does reflect her style of writing and our sound, as well as making that album even more personal and sincere, something that is what we want to reflect with our music.

Tribune: This month, Dubb Nubb put out a three-song EP of Tom Waits covers. Initially, that seemed an odd marriage to me but you pulled it off brilliantly. Talk a bit about what drew you to that project and what common ground you see between your music and his.

Rainey: First of all, we were lucky to be asked to play the Tom Waits tribute concert at Off Broadway in St. Louis this spring, in which local bands each chose three Tom Waits songs to perform. We got a really good response and had so much fun playing the covers we picked, and decided to record them!

We like to say that Dubb Nubb is sweet and mean at the same time. So through Tom's gritty ballads, we were able to bring ou - Columbia Daily Tribune

You could see how it would be easy to get snared in a web of pithy statements when it comes to describing the band Dubb Nubb. Since the group is made up of a trio of sisters – Hannah, Delia and Amanda Rainey – it wouldn't take long to compose lines about how the family that plays together, stays together or how these sisters are doing it for themselves with a DIY ethos.

But to get hung up there would be to downplay the brilliant music the Raineys make. It's a folk-pop sound that evokes innocence and simplicity on first listen but, with each subsequent spin, digs around topics and themes and sonic threads that steely and substantive.

Initially just Delia and Hannah (who referred to themselves as a "twindie" band), the group first played Columbia while the pair were still in high school. Moving here to attend the University of Missouri, they integrated Amanda into the act and the three have only grown their sound and audience from there. While the trio was on a recent East Coast tour, Amanda Rainey exchanged emails with the Tribune, shedding light on the group's creative process and what it has in common with Tom Waits, of all people.

Tribune: So, let's get the obvious question out of the way: What are the best things about being a sister act and what are the worst?

Rainey: It's fun and rewarding to write music with people you love and we get to spend a lot of time together! Also people respond really well to family bands. We have a special connection and that comes out in the music! Sometimes we have those bickering moments while on tour or writing songs, but it never lasts too long.

Tribune: If I've got my chronology right, you had played at least one True/False Film Fest before officially moving to Columbia. How did forming relationships locally through the festival in any way ease that transition and help establish a fanbase here?

Rainey: Yes, the twins played True/False when they were seniors in high school, and then the Boone Dawdle when they first moved to Columbia. These two experiences helped us ease into the arts community here! It was cool to play True/False first as a St. Louis band and then as a Columbia band. We had such a closer connection to T/F and Columbia after that.

Tribune: Speaking of growing a fanbase, the band is currently on an East Coast jag. How has touring elsewhere made you appreciative of the Midwest (and, specifically, Columbia) music scene and how has it underscored things that could be done differently here?

Rainey: Touring is an incredible thing. It's exciting to play for a group of strangers when we don't know what to expect. Columbia, especially the DIY scene, is really good and giving to its touring bands, and we are proud of that and have seen this while touring as well.

Tribune: Talk a bit about what the division of labor looks like between the three of you as far as the writing and recording process goes. Additionally, you have been pretty prolific as far as putting out new recordings. Do you feel a certain urgency or compulsion to get material out in the atmosphere as soon as you can?

Rainey: For the most part, Delia writes the lyrics and melodies. Hannah will too at times, but always writes guitar parts and harmonies. They then will practice the songs with me and I will add percussion! We've put out a collection of our songs every year, recording usually during spring break. This is such a short window of time and we realize now that our recordings can seem a little rushed. We hope to spend more time with the recording process for our next album!

Tribune: Members of the band have crafted some pretty cool artwork to go along with some of these recordings. How much intentionality have you, as a band, put into creating an overall aesthetic? Do you, in any way, see the effects and influences of other art forms on your sound at all?

Rainey: We embrace the DIY way of creating music and art. We've created a lot of the album art on our own and everything else is done by close friends. The difference when, say, Delia does the art is that it does reflect her style of writing and our sound, as well as making that album even more personal and sincere, something that is what we want to reflect with our music.

Tribune: This month, Dubb Nubb put out a three-song EP of Tom Waits covers. Initially, that seemed an odd marriage to me but you pulled it off brilliantly. Talk a bit about what drew you to that project and what common ground you see between your music and his.

Rainey: First of all, we were lucky to be asked to play the Tom Waits tribute concert at Off Broadway in St. Louis this spring, in which local bands each chose three Tom Waits songs to perform. We got a really good response and had so much fun playing the covers we picked, and decided to record them!

We like to say that Dubb Nubb is sweet and mean at the same time. So through Tom's gritty ballads, we were able to bring ou - Columbia Daily Tribune

When looking back at the summer of 2011, few locals will forget the swarms of cicadas that staged a brief, noisy invasion. For a few weeks, millions of the chirping insects took root. But where most of us found an annoyance, Amanda Rainey of the Columbia-based label Special Passenger found inspiration.

"Columbia was completely infested with millions of cicadas, so many that it literally hurt your ears to walk outside," she recalls. "Columbia went cicada crazy for a while, and Sparky's Homemade Ice Cream, where I work, made cicada ice cream. It sold out quickly and made national news."

A call went out to Twitter and Facebook: Please send cicada-themed songs for a compilation. Within a few weeks, Amanda had gathered seventeen tracks, ranging from acoustic numbers to a teenage songwriting workshop for sixteen-year-olds at Missouri Scholars Academy. The result, Cicada Summer, is a microcosm of Special Passenger in general — nominally a record label, but actually a loose network of talented friends and relatives between St. Louis, Columbia, Mississippi (where Amanda lived for a while after college) and Tennessee.

"I love the name Special Passenger because we do special and handmade things, and 'passenger' implies collaboration," Amanda says. "We print between 100 and 200 of each release and try to come up with different packaging ideas for each project. [We've done] fabric cases, screen-printed gift boxes, paper plates, homemade marbled paper, cases made from recycled materials and zines with mini CDs."

Special Passenger's roster includes Lizzie Wright Super Space Ship, a Jackson native who sings about people, insects (even when there are no proper insect-related events) and grad school, and Cory Taylor Cox, a Memphis folkie who has spent most of 2011 on tour. They play shows together, visit each other's hometowns and share compilation and split-seven-inch space.

However, St. Louis' Dubb Nubb is Special Passenger's flagship band. Literally keeping it in the family, nineteen-year-old twin sisters Delia and Hannah Rainey have been writing and playing together for four years now. Amanda, their older sister, has released Dubb Nubb's two CDs, 2009's The Best Game Ever and 2010's New Bones. This spring, she officially joined the band on drums and percussion.

Dubb Nubb is that rare band without any obvious musical influences. Hannah and Delia trade off on guitar, mandolin and percussion, while Amanda plays a small standup drum with brushes. Their songs have clear folk and bluegrass twinges but are performed in a way that's closer to boom box-era Mountain Goats or vintage K Records. (It's not hard to imagine them sharing a bill with such K acts as the Softies or Mirah.) Their vocal harmonies occasionally fall out of tune but are absolutely complementary in ways that only siblings can achieve (think Everly Brothers or Carter Family). The lyrics are often reflections of travels and long-lost friends, evoking melancholy late-night car trips through cornfields and past tawdry roadside motels.

"That's a lot of what influenced us, actually," says Hannah before a Dubb Nubb show at Villa Park in Olivette. "We spent a lot of time in cars visiting Amanda when she lived in Jackson, and playing shows there. Originally we started writing just about teenage stuff, but then it got more complicated..."

"Scenery, nature. Heartache," adds Delia.

It's been a busy summer for the Rainey sisters. They spent a few weeks in May and June touring bedrooms, basements, radio stations and record stores throughout the South and Midwest. Highlights included an impromptu set at Nashville's Mercy Lounge and a rare electric-band set on the radio in Knoxville. ("I didn't have my guitar because I thought there was going to be one there," Hannah remembers.) After a few weeks at home, Amanda departed on tour with Jackson electro-duo J-Tran, while Hannah and Delia spent five weeks as counselors at a Jewish sleepover camp in Carbondale, Illinois.

"Camp was really awesome," says Delia. "We basically got paid to hang out with a bunch of kids and our friends in the woods. We taught kids how to play instruments. There turned out to be seven kids in our class. And they were so not talented except for one. He wrote a bunch of songs. All the other kids followed him."

"There were two bands by the end of the summer," says Hannah. "The younger kids' band was called the Hungry Hungry Inchworms, and the older kids' band was Scar of David."

"They were kinda punk," Delia says about Scar of David. "They did a White Stripes cover."

Some of the other venues where Dubb Nubb has played locally since May include a twilight backyard party at eldest sister Nicky's house, the courtyard of Off Broadway in between bands and o - Riverfront Times

When looking back at the summer of 2011, few locals will forget the swarms of cicadas that staged a brief, noisy invasion. For a few weeks, millions of the chirping insects took root. But where most of us found an annoyance, Amanda Rainey of the Columbia-based label Special Passenger found inspiration.

"Columbia was completely infested with millions of cicadas, so many that it literally hurt your ears to walk outside," she recalls. "Columbia went cicada crazy for a while, and Sparky's Homemade Ice Cream, where I work, made cicada ice cream. It sold out quickly and made national news."

A call went out to Twitter and Facebook: Please send cicada-themed songs for a compilation. Within a few weeks, Amanda had gathered seventeen tracks, ranging from acoustic numbers to a teenage songwriting workshop for sixteen-year-olds at Missouri Scholars Academy. The result, Cicada Summer, is a microcosm of Special Passenger in general — nominally a record label, but actually a loose network of talented friends and relatives between St. Louis, Columbia, Mississippi (where Amanda lived for a while after college) and Tennessee.

"I love the name Special Passenger because we do special and handmade things, and 'passenger' implies collaboration," Amanda says. "We print between 100 and 200 of each release and try to come up with different packaging ideas for each project. [We've done] fabric cases, screen-printed gift boxes, paper plates, homemade marbled paper, cases made from recycled materials and zines with mini CDs."

Special Passenger's roster includes Lizzie Wright Super Space Ship, a Jackson native who sings about people, insects (even when there are no proper insect-related events) and grad school, and Cory Taylor Cox, a Memphis folkie who has spent most of 2011 on tour. They play shows together, visit each other's hometowns and share compilation and split-seven-inch space.

However, St. Louis' Dubb Nubb is Special Passenger's flagship band. Literally keeping it in the family, nineteen-year-old twin sisters Delia and Hannah Rainey have been writing and playing together for four years now. Amanda, their older sister, has released Dubb Nubb's two CDs, 2009's The Best Game Ever and 2010's New Bones. This spring, she officially joined the band on drums and percussion.

Dubb Nubb is that rare band without any obvious musical influences. Hannah and Delia trade off on guitar, mandolin and percussion, while Amanda plays a small standup drum with brushes. Their songs have clear folk and bluegrass twinges but are performed in a way that's closer to boom box-era Mountain Goats or vintage K Records. (It's not hard to imagine them sharing a bill with such K acts as the Softies or Mirah.) Their vocal harmonies occasionally fall out of tune but are absolutely complementary in ways that only siblings can achieve (think Everly Brothers or Carter Family). The lyrics are often reflections of travels and long-lost friends, evoking melancholy late-night car trips through cornfields and past tawdry roadside motels.

"That's a lot of what influenced us, actually," says Hannah before a Dubb Nubb show at Villa Park in Olivette. "We spent a lot of time in cars visiting Amanda when she lived in Jackson, and playing shows there. Originally we started writing just about teenage stuff, but then it got more complicated..."

"Scenery, nature. Heartache," adds Delia.

It's been a busy summer for the Rainey sisters. They spent a few weeks in May and June touring bedrooms, basements, radio stations and record stores throughout the South and Midwest. Highlights included an impromptu set at Nashville's Mercy Lounge and a rare electric-band set on the radio in Knoxville. ("I didn't have my guitar because I thought there was going to be one there," Hannah remembers.) After a few weeks at home, Amanda departed on tour with Jackson electro-duo J-Tran, while Hannah and Delia spent five weeks as counselors at a Jewish sleepover camp in Carbondale, Illinois.

"Camp was really awesome," says Delia. "We basically got paid to hang out with a bunch of kids and our friends in the woods. We taught kids how to play instruments. There turned out to be seven kids in our class. And they were so not talented except for one. He wrote a bunch of songs. All the other kids followed him."

"There were two bands by the end of the summer," says Hannah. "The younger kids' band was called the Hungry Hungry Inchworms, and the older kids' band was Scar of David."

"They were kinda punk," Delia says about Scar of David. "They did a White Stripes cover."

Some of the other venues where Dubb Nubb has played locally since May include a twilight backyard party at eldest sister Nicky's house, the courtyard of Off Broadway in between bands and o - Riverfront Times

These muddy river babies -- Hannah and Delia Rainey - really are partially babies. The twin sisters from St. Louis will make even those of us on the younger side of the conversation feel like old men. They'll make you feel feeble and weak, as if you haven't accomplished a damned thing is so, so long and you may never again - compared with what they already have cooking at such a young age. By the age of 15, Hannah already had five years of classical guitar training in her quiver and these two girls, who make up the group Dubb Nubb, are writing the kinds of strong arrangements and experienced compositions that it makes you wonder where you went wrong. Actually, what it really makes you do is stop dreaming for yourself. Your time is up. You're obsolete and nothing more than a relic. It's up to your kids now to do something that will make the last name proud. They are the only hopes you have left. If you're without kids, maybe you can find the kind of life fulfillment in your staunch and persistent preparation for and then performance with either the new Call of Duty your fantasy football team. Either way, you're a winner and you've accomplished something good with your life. Know this though, you're nothing compared to Hannah and Delia. These girls do everything right. They show up with a posse. They bring a large, 18-inch pizza box filled with the most incredible cookies that any mouth has ever had, free to pass around. They bring homemade CDs and 7-inches. They bring their instruments and most importantly, they bring these songs that are fully formed, developed from the minds of women. They seem to come from the lairs of people who have been folded under and chewed up a few times. They sound as if they're full of this wondrous air, but it could only come from the sorts of old souls that know that not everything is amazing, that not everything should be wished for. There are no instances of stupid, young girl boy craziness, or the preoccupations that riddle those of the texting-every-minute-of-the-day generation, who wouldn't know what's really worth thinking about or pining for if it gave them a black eye and pulled down their shorts. Dubb Nubb has created these succulent moments of introspective black holes - those HUGE thoughts that, once you get going on them, you find that they're deeper than the deepest well and you're falling forever. It's going down the rabbit's hole and they're happily falling, leaving their tracks and taking it all in, sinking as gravity will take them. We listen as they explore and them we go back to our bland and pathetic lives, contemplating why WE don't think in such colors. - Daytrotter

These muddy river babies -- Hannah and Delia Rainey - really are partially babies. The twin sisters from St. Louis will make even those of us on the younger side of the conversation feel like old men. They'll make you feel feeble and weak, as if you haven't accomplished a damned thing is so, so long and you may never again - compared with what they already have cooking at such a young age. By the age of 15, Hannah already had five years of classical guitar training in her quiver and these two girls, who make up the group Dubb Nubb, are writing the kinds of strong arrangements and experienced compositions that it makes you wonder where you went wrong. Actually, what it really makes you do is stop dreaming for yourself. Your time is up. You're obsolete and nothing more than a relic. It's up to your kids now to do something that will make the last name proud. They are the only hopes you have left. If you're without kids, maybe you can find the kind of life fulfillment in your staunch and persistent preparation for and then performance with either the new Call of Duty your fantasy football team. Either way, you're a winner and you've accomplished something good with your life. Know this though, you're nothing compared to Hannah and Delia. These girls do everything right. They show up with a posse. They bring a large, 18-inch pizza box filled with the most incredible cookies that any mouth has ever had, free to pass around. They bring homemade CDs and 7-inches. They bring their instruments and most importantly, they bring these songs that are fully formed, developed from the minds of women. They seem to come from the lairs of people who have been folded under and chewed up a few times. They sound as if they're full of this wondrous air, but it could only come from the sorts of old souls that know that not everything is amazing, that not everything should be wished for. There are no instances of stupid, young girl boy craziness, or the preoccupations that riddle those of the texting-every-minute-of-the-day generation, who wouldn't know what's really worth thinking about or pining for if it gave them a black eye and pulled down their shorts. Dubb Nubb has created these succulent moments of introspective black holes - those HUGE thoughts that, once you get going on them, you find that they're deeper than the deepest well and you're falling forever. It's going down the rabbit's hole and they're happily falling, leaving their tracks and taking it all in, sinking as gravity will take them. We listen as they explore and them we go back to our bland and pathetic lives, contemplating why WE don't think in such colors. - Daytrotter