Oh, to each his own, definitely, but it still has to be said: Subsonic’s predilection for the understated belies their youth, and they’re all the better for it. Jump from “Animinimism” to “Further” and you experience wildly disparate cadences, and this I feel is a key strength of Subsonic Eye’s, knowing how most math-y bands almost always gravitate towards pulsating rhythms, equating over-sensitized maximalism with optimal expression. In short, they’re not middle-of-the-road settlers, but they’re not prisoners of flash either.
Listening to the carefree gear-shifting in the first act alone-the moody bedroom noodling of “Consumer Blues,” the jangly major-seventh magnificence of “Cabin Fever,” the sonic urgency of “Fruitcake”-one hears not just lots of heart but also an unmistakable diligence.Ĭlearly, Nature isn’t the work of a band who, when faced with an arrangement conundrum, would settle for a “jam.” They sound like bright-eyed puzzle-piecers and spirited problem-solvers, not over-compensators who would needlessly regale us with sorry stabs at Bach, say, or Zappa. It finds the band locating that elusive sweet spot between the pedestrian and the cerebral: a masterclass trapeze act, if we’re being honest. On Nature of Things, their third full-length release under Middle Class Cigars, they shed dog-eared associations and churn out some of the most memorable tunes in any genre, and they do it with equal parts emotional transparency and technical relish.
But on the other, they and their ilk are, ultimately, shackled by labels that carry neither musical import nor clarity of thought. On the one hand it’s a useful map for new fans, streaming nomads, and chance-encounter fiends. Even a cursory sweep of early press on Singapore’s Subsonic Eye will tell you they’ve been aggressively pigeonholed: dreampop this, shoegaze that angular post-rock here, ethereal noise there.
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