solvents

Solvents
Undertown, Port Townsend
Friday, Feb. 4
Upcoming Seattle Show: Solvents play the High Dive on Tuesday with Case and Ctrl, and Priory. Show starts at 8 p.m., and the cover is $6.

Contrary to popular belief, not all bands are from Brooklyn. Or from any big city. Take for example long-running Port Townsend group Solvents. Begun a decade ago as the solo project of songwriter Jarrod Bramson, the band has flown largely under the radar despite a steady release schedule and time spent touring with the likes of Karl Blau and Kimya Dawson.

Port Townsend, admittedly, lends itself to isolation. A little town on the tip of the Olympic Peninsula, it's surrounded by the usual suspects, water and pine trees. As with most respectable villages, businesses close early, so it can feel like a small miracle to find a venue that's all-ages, open past 8, and mercifully free of former high-school classmates. Such was the case with coffee shop-cum-wine bar Undertown on Friday night, where Solvents played a supposedly "mellow" set of their electrified folk-rock.

Solvents were on to the combination of electric guitar and violin long before groups like Arcade Fire. Not to say they sound orchestral--rather, their urgent, emotional songs lean more toward Pedro the Lion or Rivers Cuomo's home recordings. Frontman Bramson backs his confessional lyrics with chord progressions that cause warmth to spread through your body like a couple beers on an empty stomach, creating that certain indescribable satisfaction reserved for perfect pop songs. But Emily Madden's violin, at times following the melody, at times branching off, differentiates Solvents songs from the straightforward, power-chord ballads of a band like Hüsker Dü.

Just as not all bands form in a city, not all fans grew up in one, either. So we should stop being surprised when we find hardworking, talented musicians in our small towns and suburbs. Rather than calling Solvents the best rock band in Port Townsend today, we should acknowledge their ability to stand on their own merit. With a new album, Forgive Yr. Blood, a recent live performance on KEXP, and plans to tour to Austin's South by Southwest, this could be their moment.

The crowd: A mix of gray-haired folks and young people, peaceably intermingled.

Overheard: Re: Port Townsend fashion: "She wears pearls. Like, really nice pearls. And sweatpants!" - www.seattleweekly.com

Last, but not least were Port Townsend’s Solvents, who handled a diminished crowd like pros. The Solvents specialize in moody, surprisingly heavy folk songs, that when performed live feel as much punk-rock as singer-songwriter. For those who stuck around late for them, the Solvents gave their all and put on a real show. Focusing mostly on their new release Forgive Yr. Blood with a couple tunes off an old Sound on the Sound favorite Manresa Castle, the Solvents left their hearts and a gallon of sweat on the stage. When a band works that hard on stage and even the violin shreds, its really tough to call it folk at all. - www.soundonthesound.com

Solvents are a trio from Port Townsend, Wash., a fact that is betrayed in their latest full-length release Forgive Yr. Blood. The album encapsulates all of the powerful emotions with which one contends while living in a small town. The frustration and longing you feel after seeing that special ex-somebody is captured in the track "Soft Reminders," while the angsty restlessness that is born out of feeling stifled is conveyed in the song "Yr. Ghost Writer."

While some tracks use chipper piano jingles reminiscent of a dusty saloon in the Wild West, others are pushed along by fuzzy guitar riffs and hazy vocals, giving the album an experimental folk sound. The songs are diverse, mirroring the plethora of emotions which define human existence. A defining characteristic is the ever-present violin that will hum gently into your ears like a seaport breeze.

7.5/10 - www.theconcordian.com

Listening to Forgive Yr. Blood, the latest album from Port Townsend-based Solvents, is a folk-punk indie rock joy all the way through. The melancholic, urgently melodic vocals get into your memory and leave elegant lived-in ruminations alongside sharply funny lyrical observations about working class love, life, failure, and desire. This is indie-based pop, but not chilly or arch, more like a warm blanket given by an old friend as you sit down by the space heater in his basement to chatter over old times and flames with a little bourbon. The fact this is music is created by an engaged couple who played together in a traditional Irish folk band, with a friend on drums, in an area known as a laid back, inspired artists community is not surprising.

The middle of the eight song CD is the tour-inspired confessions of “We Were Guests Here,” on which singer-songwriter Jarrod Paul Bramson (also guitar, bass, piano, some drums, etc.) captures that smoking-behind-the-club-after-an-exhausting-set, before-hitting-getting-in-the-van-again mood perfectly. - www.kexp.org

“I don’t want no mind control; I just want to rock and roll.”

This line, from Solvents’ bummed out saloon song and Forgive Yr. Blood penultimate track, “Empty Vessel Blues,” is set after a great deal of passionate reverie. The words stand as singer Jarrod Bramson’s straightforward confession of enlightenment. After all the discourse leads us in circles and sometimes towards brainwashing, it’s rock and roll that comes to rescue us more often than not.

If you’re wondering why you haven’t heard of Solvents, it might be for a number of reasons. The trio comes from the coastal city of Port Townsend, which is just far enough from Seattle to be outside the urban bubble. This is hardly near the top of the list of places you’d expect to deliver noteworthy music. Second, Bramson and violinist wife Emily Madden are parents of three young daughters, which prevents them from touring more than a few weeks a year though they frequently play within the Port Townsend city limits. Lastly, the band is very careful about not letting their music spread through BitTorrent and the likes–they’ve got a few extra mouths to feed.

Though these factors may stunt buzz from spreading, Solvents commitment to craft is abundantly present throughout this short but sweet record. The opener, “Forgive Yr. Blood,” carries an early Arcade Fire flavor. Though any folk-tinged indie rock with prominent string playing often sounds a bit like that band these days, Bramson sings with the same sort of vulnerable swagger as Win Butler (the opening question posed on the title track is “Was it always so overwhelming, like the borders of our lies?”).

On “Soft Reminders,” the guitars plug in and the fuzz factor is cranked up. Here, Bramson presents another excellent melody in front of a much denser arrangement closer to early Pavement. The piano driven “How You Gonna Steal (Revolutionary Feel)” begins with one of the better ‘Yeah!’s in recent memory. The lyrics continue the theme of opaque reminiscence: “A thousand points of pain washed away with summer rain/Now you’re holding on and hiding by the door.” The front half is concluded with highlight, “We Were Guests Here,” which welcomes back the guitar blast. But it’s the violin that truly soars here, with Madden providing the adrenaline boost to make this really special.

Right after the full-on rock, “It’s Alright Maisey (Down at the Goldrush),” dives into country poignancy. Though more subdued than “We Were Guests Here,” it’s this song where it becomes clear that Jarrod Bramson is one hell of a singer. “Yr. Ghost Writer” and “Empty Vessel Blues” keep the train rolling until the bizarre “The Coastal Plain” ends things on a question mark. The song kicks off with Sasha Landis’ heavily distorted drums in the forefront and morphs into a post-modern Beastie Boys acid trip. Solvents fully establish themselves as an open-minded ensemble but the song feels more like a wacked-out bonus track than a grand finale.

It takes a bit longer to fall in love with an album that isn’t recorded in high quality, but once it settles in, the substance outshines the technical shortcomings. Though one can’t help pondering “what if this had the pro-studio treatment?”, the actual music and lyrics match each other in their unpretentious, unforgiving aesthetic. Solvents have a bit of punk in them despite their wide variation of arrangements and chord progressions. Forgive Yr. Blood is something worth yr. while, warts and all. - www.ssgmusic.com

A lo-fi masterpiece

Based in the tiny coastal town of Port Townsend, Washington, Solvents offer up a compelling mix of acoustic and electric tunes on the self-released debut, Forgive Yr Blood. Built around the vocals and guitar of Jarrod Bramson, filled out with Sascha Landis on drums and Emily Madden’s expressive violin, Solvents take the listener through a varied musical journey. Lo-fi production adds ambience to Bramson’s urgent delivery on songs like “Forgive Yr Blood” and “Empty Vessel Blues”, while unexpected bursts of distortion enliven “Soft Reminders” and “We Were Guests Here”. Through it all, Bramson reveals a strong sense of melody, making the best use of his rough-hewn, often distorted voice and the band’s chosen sonic palette, which is substantive but never flashy. By the time you reach album closer “The Coastal Plain”, with its rumbling drums, siren-wail guitar, and mumbled vocals, you realize you’ve just sat through a record made by a hell of a band. Forgive Yr Blood is anti-arena-rock made perfect. It’s a small-scale, lo-fi masterpiece. - www.popmatters.com

In an age when major bands’ albums are distributed on BitTorrent within hours of their release, actually buying a record can seem recklessly, even ludicrously, spendthrift. Unfortunately for you (but very fortunate indeed for Jarrod Bramson, Emily Madden and Sasha Landis), Solvents’ new album, Forgive Yr. Blood, won’t be on BitTorrent. You’re actually going to have to buy a copy, personally folded and stamped by frontman Bramson, and you’re going to be glad you did.

Solvents’ highly effective DRM is an undeserved obscurity outside the Pacific Northwest, reinforced by an obstinate refusal to leave the little town of Port Townsend, Washington and a commitment to tour for no more than three weeks at a time, as both Bramson and Madden have little girls waiting for them at home. Listening to the eight tracks on Forgive Yr. Blood, acoustically tinged with the echoes of the old eight-bedroom Victorian that serves as their home studio, it is easy to hear personal integrity manifest as musical integrity in a succession of heartfelt, individually crafted tracks that range from the unaffected folk of “It’s Alright Maisey” to the punk-tinged alt rock of “The Coastal Plain.”

The fusion of diverse influences is simple and raw, but charged and emotional for that very reason. Madden’s violin calls its hearer, siren-like, to a fineness of sentiment outside and above the appealing humanity of Bramson’s vocals, setting up a cathartic tension through which Landis’ drums drive inexorably. In a way, Forgive Yr. Blood is hard to listen to, like a Goya painting is hard to look at, or a Baudelaire poem is hard to read—it is hard because it connects us uncomfortably to our earthly and heavenly selves all at once and leaves its listener in that profound state of rootbound exaltation that lays bare the beauty of life’s inevitable courses. High or low, fast or slow, every second of this album had to happen and we are healed by the realization.

This is rock and roll as the high art it has always deserved to be. If you only buy one album this year (and if you’re under 30 you probably will), make it this one on November 30.

Score: 10 / 10 - www.rocknrollreport.com

Solvents‘ singer/guitarist Jarrod Bramson’s songs are thoughtful with a wide array of influences that makes the music hard to put into a box. Bramson’s vocals are positively desperate and disarming. with a great deal of vulnerability there. But while Bramson is the primary songwriter, violinist Emily Madden’s contributions are just as invaluable. She lends the compositions a sometimes light, sometimes ominous layer and can change the entire tone of a song. Because of this dynamic, half of Forgive Yr. Blood could very easily fit on a soundtrack to a modern western (I could definitely hear “Empty Vessel Blues,” in a saloon scene), while other songs come across as soulful deconstructions of tunes from John Hughes teen flicks (“We Were Guests Here,”).

These aren’t complex arrangements as there are never more than three instruments at once. Any more would be clutter within the lo-fi production. The songs remind me of a stripped down Arcade Fire. There is also a bit of a hodgepoge genre-wise with some folk (“It’s Alright Maisey,”), some indie pop (“Soft Reminders,”), while closer, “The Coastal Plain”, resembles a backing track from the Beastie Boys‘ Check Your Head. Even with all of these flavors, there is no hint of pretentiousness. These are honest and heartfelt songs that should lead to their breakthrough.
DISQUS...
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