Dr Dolittle

I headed over to Silver Dollar on Friday to check out a few local bands. I arrived just as Major Tune Up was winding down. Composed of members of We're Marching On, it was trance-y indie rock with repeating guitar, bass, and effects loops and pedals. It wasn't very interesting music.

At first blush, Kristen Cudmore of Language-Arts should be playing twee music. With a high-pitch girlish voice and tendency to speak in non sequiturs or at least out-of-left field topics, you might think "where's the ukulele to complete this picture?" Tonight was perhaps even more than usual. First, she was previewing her 2014 album: with a Unicorn on the cover! Then somehow it became a reference to the latest dance meme "What sound does a fox make?" But we didn't end up making fox noises. Instead she tried to get the audience to make raccoon noises (in honour of Racoon  Wedding's LP release) which, apparently for Cudmore, was a sort of Pokemon cat purr.

But her music wasn't Zooey Deschanel's 500 Days of Summer pixie. It did contain some light pop elements with plucked chords and synth. But mostly it was catchy and muscular thanks to the drummer and bassist (a new replacement who started just 3 practices ago). They laid down a complex groove of snappy snares, jazzy bass lines, and syncopated crescendos. Cudmore also cranked her guitar on a couple of tunes, delivering some sonic waves. She is too twee to probably ever head-banged or raise the devil's horns, but her music does rock.