The Ocean Floor
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The Ocean Floor

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The best kept secret in music

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"The Ocean Floor - Tall Tales and Small Tales"

The Ocean Floor -- essentially the nom de plume of principle songwriter and performer Lane Barrington -- is the collaborative audio equivalent of a Wes Anderson flick, and the accompanying "Floorchestra" his cast of Tenenbaums. They're couched in the outwardly inane, finding epiphanies like buried treasure in the minutia of the everyday and the personal, sculpting cockeyed fairytales from the convoluted eccentricities to be found in seemingly normal situations. And if Barrington is Anderson, the auteur who asks us to delve into his world rather than meet us in our own, and Tall Tales & Small Tales is his child, then it may be a little bit touched in the head. Enamored with a sense of wonder and fascination while never supposing that the novelty of any given situation can ever run out, the album is a loot bag of bejeweled sounds and Barrington’s lyrical versions of a suburban magic-realism. It contains anti-cynicism in concentrated form and whimsical weirdness for weirdness’ sake, all of it bypassing twee’s often overbearing preciousness and supposition that being calculatedly unconventional or childlike should be enough.

Behind Tall Tales & Small Tales’ preliminary spazz-folk surface, defined at first by Barrington’s silly-voiced falsetto, are musical arrangements that are complex, enthusiastically creative and unpredictable. Each song is an accumulation of arcane discoveries, trinkets hidden in seemingly arbitrary fashion throughout the overcrowded, creepy grandmother’s home the album-as-whole provides. Generally acoustic but quick blossoming -- and in the least obvious places, with horns and strings, banjo and bells -- each song testifies to Barrington’s songwriting versatility; listed as the primary performer of most of the album’s varied instrumentation, Barrington displays an impressive and accomplished scope without sliding into pedantic virtuosity. Similarly impressive is that he maintains his idiosyncrasies. The Ocean Floor’s a cipher-less puzzle that remains steadfastly personal and never lectures, is perfectly happy to be alone (and have fun) in its weirdness. Populated by childlike characters and hyper-personified emotions, the album is a Neverland of Barrington’s own design.

The seven-minute “Bedbugs” starts with jittery, tremulous strings over pleasant acoustic undertones, providing just one of the album’s many and near-constant odd-ball declarations: "I’m so excited now / I probably shouldn’t say / I've got a big date with a librarian today!” The line sort of hangs there, satisfied with the pseudo-novelty of its own mild geekiness -- critic bait for those who fell off the Napoleon Dynamite train early. But in the context of the song’s sincere enthusiasm, and preceding the line that it does (“Our talking books will all shut up and they’ll have to listen / And when the night is done they’ll open up again”), it no longer seems as premeditated and strained in its humor. There’s a moment where you realize Barrington might actually mean it, and the sooner this moment takes place the sooner Tall Tales endears itself.

"Pillows & Molasses" is tougher to crack; it may or may not be about bears, has a narration about an airplane, kitschy DJ scratching (replete with "put your hands in the air and wave them like you don't care"), and arbitrary, adventurous contributions that last only a few ADD-fueled seconds. "Inner Ear" is the most accessible track on the album at just under two minutes, and also the catchiest, but Tall Tales is about diversions and distractions. The succinctness of “Inner Ear” seems almost an obligation. Like how without chores there would be no escape, that kind of thing.

"Every Grass Stained Day"'s title summarizes the nostalgia and playfulness of the Ocean Floor's music as well as its almost vaudevillian shifts in moods. A piano line that could be out of an elementary school performance gradually finds its way to a busy marching band outburst and a moody, elegant close. The song feels episodic and disconnected, the same way cartoons feel broken up by commercial breaks and their ensuring hyperbolic action. But “Every Grass Stained Day,” and most of the music on Tall Tales, doesn’t capture the two-dimensional emotional pap of Saturday morning cartoons. It’s about the experience of watching them, the breakfast cereal and the day that follows.

And, like that, the album ends with the same disjointed suddenness, with Barrington denying conformity to conventional album structure the way he purposefully keeps his songs from the
"maturity" of straightforwardness or clarity. As a jumbled bag of sounds and melodies the album is as memorable as the controlled chaos of childhood it evokes.

-Conrad Amenta - Coke Machine Glow


"The Ocean Floor - Tall Tales and Small Tales"

This band is officially all over the place. The music is soft and lovely, starting off with an old jazz-tinged number that somehow morphs into some sort of hypnotizing chamber pop. Some of the album is reminiscent of Rachel's, the exception being the noticeably unique vocals that are somewhat quiet and folkish, yet squeaky in their own way.

Many treats and surprises crop up from the band's experimental song structures and wide array of utilized instruments. While the main musical theme seems to be the aforementioned vocals poetically serenading atop an acoustic guitar, you will also hear the occasional accompaniment of violins, piano, banjo, bells and even a little vinyl scratching.

Aside from the many moments of randomness, the album as a whole has a coherence that can be appreciated and a style that is truly its own.

-Stu Hood - SHZine.com


"The Ocean Floor - Tall Tales and Small Tales"


Their third release, Tall Tales and Small Tales, is like... it's like Charles Mingus joined some hybrid band somewhere between The Unicorns/Of Montreal/Phantom Buffalo. With hints of Neutral Milk Hotel. And Sufjan Stevens. And... Devendra Banhart. And they have so many instruments! A clarinet, a trumpet, a trombone, violins, a banjo, an upright bass, pianos, jazz drums, and I'm pretty sure I heard a triangle somewhere in there (The Ocean's First). The promo sheet also notes that they use "makeshift instruments such as . . . Dad's soft knock at the door when you're falling asleep." Creepy.

Also, I gots to say, they have some fantastic lyrics. Take this line from the fourth track, Pillows and Molasses:
"Wish I could zip up my bear suit and settle down / With pointed fingers, they're always saying, "You're not a bear!" Nice. - dangbuddy.com


"Review of Work: Tall Tales and Small Tales"

As one of the primary fulcrums of the local indie-rock collective Funbalaya, Lane Barrington was as much an artistic activist as a musician, generating the ideas and propounding the community-building philosophies that made the loose-knit group as interesting to observe as to listen to. It’s yet to be seen if Barrington’s recent departure for Portland will have any sort of negative effect on the scene he helped nurture, but the music found on Tall Tales shows that the scene was integral in the realization of his odd sonic visions. Sean Moore (Dodger, the Heathens) provides considerable multi-instrumental assistance on these complex, layered compositions, while various other Funbalaya “members” make their presence known in the disc’s dense arrangements. Barrington’s personable approach to quirk-pop nonetheless defines the proceedings, and while lyrics like “I raise a tall glass of milk to your chocolate chip eyes” (“Up Comes the Sun”) won’t do much to change anyone’s perception of said scene’s bookish preciousness, the challenging structures and unique sonic palette of Tall Tales are solid proof that Orlando’s loss will be Portland’s gain.
- Jason Ferguson - Orlando Weekly


"The Ocean Floor, “You Can Step on My Toes, Please” from Tall Tales & Small Tales"

As one of the primary fulcrums of the local indie-rock collective Funbalaya, Lane Barrington was as much an artistic activist as a musician, generating the ideas and propounding the community-building philosophies that made the loose-knit group as interesting to observe as to listen to. It’s yet to be seen if Barrington’s recent departure for Portland will have any sort of negative effect on the scene he helped nurture, but the music found on Tall Tales shows that the scene was integral in the realization of his odd sonic visions. Sean Moore (Dodger, the Heathens) provides considerable multi-instrumental assistance on these complex, layered compositions, while various other Funbalaya “members” make their presence known in the disc’s dense arrangements. Barrington’s personable approach to quirk-pop nonetheless defines the proceedings, and while lyrics like “I raise a tall glass of milk to your chocolate chip eyes” (“Up Comes the Sun”) won’t do much to change anyone’s perception of said scene’s bookish preciousness, the challenging structures and unique sonic palette of Tall Tales are solid proof that Orlando’s loss will be Portland’s gain. - Wilamette Week


Discography

2007 - Tall Tales and Small Tales (Swim Slowly Records)
2004 - Pearls Are Graceful Hairdressers
2001 - Landcars & Sandcycles

Tall Tales and Small Tales received college radio airplay around North America. Chouette Promotion (www.chouetteshop.com) handles our radio promotion.

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Bio

The Ocean Floor has been a revolving door of musicians assisting Lane Barrington (the principle songwriter) for the past seven years.
Started in Florida in 2001, The Ocean Floor began by recording its first self-released full length, "Landcars and Sandcycles" with Alan Singley at his mom's house. Since then the line-up has swelled to as
many members as eight. This was called "The Ocean Floorchestra." This group toured around the southeast before Barrington relocated to Portland, OR in 2006. At present, The Ocean Floor is a duo comprised
of Shannon Steele (ex. White Fang, The Rag and Bone Men) on violin and sharing the singing with Lane. "Tall Tales & Small Tales" - the
group's third record was released on March 27th, 2007 on The Robot Ate Me's own imprint - Swim Slowly Records. "Tall Tales and Small Tales" is a fifteen-track collection of short and long, true and false, silly and touching musical stories. These songs are fleshed out with traditional instruments such as (clarinets, trumpets, trombones, violins, banjo, stand-up bass, and jazz drum-kits) as well as
makeshift instruments such as (washing machine bass drum, "tom"pani's,
dad's soft knock at the door, finger-lip bubbles, etc.). Some of the topics explored in the songs are the differences and similarities between humans and all other members of the animal kingdom, Paul
McCartney's fall from grace as a capable decision maker, the decisions we must make between personal happiness and unselfishness, the difficulty of knowing you may survive a journey but you may also
witness the collapse and downfall of your companion, and the ability to love someone so much that you live to make them a better person and not necessarily to love you. The Ocean Floor is currently playing in and around the Pacific Northwest and the current duo is set to begin recording spring of 2008.