Lime Colony
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Lime Colony

Berkeley, California, United States | SELF

Berkeley, California, United States | SELF
Band Rock Folk

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This band has not uploaded any videos
This band has not uploaded any videos

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"New at PCR: Lime Colony"

The second release (and first full-length) from Bay Area quartet Lime Colony delivers wistful, well-crafted tracks perfect for a mid-afternoon or early-evening front porch listening session, possibly in a rocking chair. A light breeze would be the preferred accompaniment.
According to the band’s website, Lime Colony “formed at a college graduation party, before [either member] knew anything about playing guitars. Their previous venture was unmentionable.” Fans of Clem Snide, Silver Jews, and Bobby Bare Jr will likely be drawn to the partly-spoken, partly-sung vocals, and the oft-witty, oft-erudite lyrics keep things interesting throughout.
As explained by vocalist/multi-instrumentalist Earl Kramer, the band’s sound was informed by high school forays into jazz, followed by a heavier rotation of indie rock in college. While the band in general puts forth a laid-back and accessible sound — with just the right counterpoint of challenging movements throughout — they consistently remind the listener that they haven’t forgotten how to make noise: Their propensity for driving guitars, along with a strong percussive presence, creates a nice balance to the delicate rhythms of acoustic guitar at the foundation of the tracks.
The album presents a nice exploration of sounds within the folk rock stamp, including an interesting array of instrumentation, with touches of ethereal moog, swelling brass, and, per their myspace page: “walpotar, sansula, accordion, and circus bees.” Well-produced and highly-listenable, Lime Colony is a very solid effort from an ambitious young band, well worth a few rotations for any set of curious ears.
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Genres: Folk Rock / Chamber Roots
File Under: Summertime soundtracks / Music for a highway roadtrip or a countryside drive
Noteworthy Tracks:
#1 – Terry’s Theme I (a beautiful, wordless rhythmic rumination with symphonic undertones, and by far the most unique track on the album)
#2 – A Breezy Leaf (semisweet love song with on-again, off-again galloping rhythms)
#3 – When No One’s There To See (breezy, twangy, and slightly resigned)
#4 – Lightning Strike (a melodic, affecting, swelling song with a lovely two-minute instrumental outro)
#9 – Perfectly Annoying (slightly anthemic and vaguely epic) - Pirate Cat Radio


"Lime Colony Review"

Recommended if you like: The Flaming Lips, Badly Drawn Boy, Wilco, The Decemberists, Bela Fleck

Lime Colony’s self-titled release is an example of an album that is better than the sum of its parts—what it lacks in truly memorable melodies or vocals, it more than makes up for in intelligent, intricate instrumental arrangements. This is music that will grow on you. In fact, the whole album grows, beginning in its first track (“Terry’s Theme”) with some very simple guitar strumming; a second guitar is added, then a horn, a saxophone, percussion, until it builds into a beautiful, layered instrumental track—witih definite echoes of contemporary folk master Bela Fleck—before quietly fading back out.

In this way, each track builds on and develops from the last. The autumnal imagery and bittersweetness of “A Breezy Leaf” gives way to the more downbeat and snowflake-heavy “When No One’s There To See”; the first song describes death, the second, the dissonance and disconnection in a relationship. Nature, artificiality, death, rebirth, the cycling of the seasons, and the crumbling of connections (perhaps most blatantly acknowledged in the bonus track, “When the Bridge Was Down”) are ideas and themes that recur and intertwine throughout all of these songs.

The next three pieces meld together: in “Lightning Strike,” the narrator describes lying in bed after his wife or girlfriend committed suicide. The song builds with electric guitars and drums, and segues into “Terry’s Theme II,” which echoes the first track’s melody, replacing the organic guitars and horns with militant snares and synthesizers, a bittersweet electronic answer to the acoustic opener. As this piece climaxes, the next song, “Throw,” begins: “Wake up,” and again, out of death comes rebirth. “Throw” is another painful song (“All you do,” says the chorus, “is throw me away/All you do is toss me by the wayside”) but there is the possibility of reconciliation; the lyrics play with the “makeup” that conceals, and the chance to “make up”–to tear down artificiality and reconnect.

The final four songs hearken back to the first half of the album, developing the album’s melodic and lyrical themes even as the album fades away back into silence, like musical chiasmus. “Left Upright” is one of the most melancholy songs on the disc—quiet, with effective use of horns. “Making Nice” begins as a catchy, clever pop-rock tune, with more than a hint of BNL (“I know everything there is to know about Freddy Kreuger and Jason/She said, ‘You don’t need to know that, it’s useless information”), before building into something a bit more serious and sincere, as angst and longing creep in and the hook-heavy guitars are replaced with swelling strings. The track concludes with perhaps the most rousing instrumental passage on the album (before, again, stripping back to the basics—the crescendo and decrescendo, rising and falling, are at the heart of this album’s musical structure).

“Perfectly Annoying” begins with an accordion—redemptive, gentle major chord changes mirroring the closing moments of “Making Nice”. This is the most upbeat track on the album, bringing back the “makeup” motif, and ends with a final, feel-good reprise of “Terry’s Theme”.

Finally, “Houdini” closes things out—maybe the best single on the album, with a simple, sad melody and vocals, terrific lyrics (“Stop trying to be Houdini, it’s not working out/The rabbit is dead in your hands, disappointing your fans, Houdini”), some lovely fingerpicking guitar, and a mournful violin. It’s Lime Colony’s saddest song, appropriately coming after their happiest, tying things up with an appropriate and palpable bittersweetness.

While Lime Colony sometimes lacks polish—there are a few buzzing guitars, and perhaps the album’s greatest weakness is that the vocals rarely reach the expressive level of the instrumentals—at its best, especially in the instrumental breaks and builds and ebbs and tides, this group on par with the greatest indie-folk-rock bands, and this is an incredibly mature, complex, and professional album for a group so young and relatively unknown. I definitely recommend it to any fans of the genre, and Lime Colony is a group well worth watching.

Lime Colony: A- - Linescratchers


Discography

The Advantage Of Getting There First (EP - 2008)
Lime Colony (LP - 2010)

Photos

Bio

Lime Colony could refer to a fruit, or a color or shade, or even less likely, a real place very far away. Lime Colony is also: Tim Garcia, who plays acoustic guitar and sings and occasionally grows out his beard; Colin Ruegsegger, who plays drums and has the deepest voice; Will Waldron, who plays bass and is the best at electricity; and Earl Kramer, who plays electric guitar and sings and has three small children and a wife.

Lime Colony has released an EP, The Advantage Of Getting There First (2008) and the self-titled full-length, Lime Colony (2010).