Honey Clouds - Cover The Forest

Two listens and I'm hooked.

Lately I've been listening to a lot of simple acoustic music. Lots of old country, old folk. So when you put Cover the Forest in your CD player and Fever Rabbit kicks in with this loopy, demented circus music... and then a heavily distorted guitar starts to climb up over it... it's breaking up because of the excessive fuzz... then there's this jangly twang and Honey Clouds collect themselves and crash all over the circus music... it lingers in the background for a moment and then a bird call spirits it away.

And you're left with a buzzy energetic frenzy.

It was a change of pace for my ears, but man was it a good choice. That's all I'm trying to say.

The album is high energy. 12 tracks and clocks in at just under 40 minutes. It bounces from track to track and tempo to tempo with focused intensity. Creates a diverse landscape of sonic fun.

The jump kick of Fever Rabbit gives way to a soupier Kites and Balloons. It pulses and sways on a dreamy organ while Trey Hughes recounts a winter evening in his unpolished, high-in-the-throat voice.

And then it's back to a twangy mesh of twisted poppy goodness with Nester. The album travels over a wide range of tempos and sensibilities with a sort of organic suddenness. Often in the same song.

It was around the point that the horns kick in on Crumble On the Shore that I realize this is a giddy beach-pop album twisted in a funhouse mirror. In songs like Still As You, what could be a ho-hum post-punk anthem is made compelling and sticky by these crazy lead guitar riffs that stretch over the chord progression like stringy cobwebs.

Ron Harrity starts off Lazy Smoke with simple noodling on his trebled up guitar, Trey steps in with his voice but it's not until Mandy Wheeler's bass and Sean Wilkinson's drums hit your ears that you realize this could be a 60s soul number. There's something about the way songs like this explore dynamic range that sends chills down my spines. I love when the chorus hits and you want to swell up along with the band.

Harrity produced Cover the Forest with wonderful clarity. The tracks are all distinct and easily identifiable but each song is greater than the sum of its parts. I especially love the tone he gets in his guitar. It's bright with a (forgive me) peapod snap to it.

Honey Clouds songs seem to have movements to them. Take Sugar, for instance, it bounces along like some saccharine cartoon and then you hit a - it's not a slump - but there're repeated moments in the song when it feels like those butterfly moments as you're driving a car, when you go over a hill with too much speed. And the second movement, a chorus, I suppose, moves along dreamily and then the song struts back up to the uptempo bounce-along of the verse.

It's fun stuff.

Stormy Roux was instantly one of my favorite tracks. There's this hooky trampoline bounce between the chords that leads to a tremendously danceable - or at least get-down-toable - chorus. The song feels like a top-down convertible ride and the final minute is full of the kind of wonderful, infectious energy that makes me want to stomp on the gas and blast off.

Despite the overwhelming good, there are two flaws for me. One is that, at less than 40 minutes, it's too short. That's not a huge problem, and easily fixed by just listening to it again.

And the track Even In A Scrawl doesn't do much for me. While most of the album feels like it's saying something about fun poppy music with a twisted, post-punk production, Even In A Scrawl just feels flat. It's still got a lot of energy and I'm sure that to see it live would still get me rocking along with the band, but I think it lives in the shadow of the clever and towering tracks around it.

Cover the Forest is a great way to get psyched up for summer. Take it to the beach, frolic on the prom with it. Dose yourself with some Honey Clouds verve.

Posted by Krister