Thursday, December 15, 2011

STN Albums Of The Year no.16: A Classic Education - Call It Blazing

Setting aside the orchestral pomp of their first releases, Bologna's A Classic Education take on a similar power alt-rock with murky depths ballpark to Modest Mouse or the Shins by way of pastoral XTC. Given a well rounded and filled out production, there's considerably more going on than first listen will willingly give up - the snappy guitars, the satisfied but still ambitious warmth in Jonathan Clancy's voice, the washes of subtle dreampop noise and sharply jangling 60s garage rock that make a good few of these songs with their instantly hookish melodies sound like newly recovered Nuggets garage rock gone askew. An Instragam haze and naturalesque reverb give it a hip touch but it's a more timless, less immediate skin they fully inhabit.

[iTunes]
[Amazon]

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