Released 25/10/2010, on Wichita Recordings



Cloud Nothings is 18 year old Dylan Baldi and, though its very boring and awfully obvious to say so, he is the latest exponent of the ubiquitous American DIY scene that is slowly worming its way out of the blogs and hipster fanzine scene and into the mainstream. 

Right up front it has to be said that if you’re looking for crisp piano ballads and clear lyrics, Cloud Nothings will most certainly not be for you.  All 13 tracks of this album, a taster made up of songs from last years Turning On E.P  and other past singles and rarities before the first ‘proper’ record is brought out in 2011, are bathed in swathes of distortion and fuzz that make word-clarifying nigh on impossible for all but the most accessible tunes.  It matters not, though, as instead we are given an album of genuine warmth that is stacked with jangly guitar lines that ensure you’ll still be humming them when you walk back through the door.

Recent single 'Hey Cool Kid' has the most recognisable chorus, and is a perfect addition to any slacker compilation, whilst 'Turning On' is the closest thing the album has to an epic with its finale of staccato guitars that elevate it to much more than just a fuzz-fest.  Preceding that its guitar line is pure surf-pop, of the sort that insists you bob your head from side to side (I’m doing it now) in an appropriation of the look of one of those very punchable Christians that seem to find a  reason to be interminably happy all the time.

'Strummin’' is the records big ballad, with Baldi’s voice moving up an octave while his fingers pick out a lackadaisical strum pattern that’ll find its way into the hearts of stoners everywhere, before the music slows, changes pace and Dylan croons ‘my babies been gone for fourteen years/the last time I saw her she was only wearing tears.’  The pace immediately changes again with 'My Little Ex Ray Gun’ which could be Interpol  if they decided they wanted to piss of their label, whilst the dark echoed vocals of 'I Am Rooftop' contrast with the party party ‘oh oh oh/oh oh oh’ of ‘Morgan.’

It’s not a perfect album by any stretch, but there’s melody galore and for a record that is essentially a cobbling together of stuff recorded very much in Cloud Nothings’ infancy, it bodes very well for the debut proper.
 


7/10

Posted In Album Reviews, Oct 21 2010. Words - David