Photo © Olivia Themudo
It took me all of about five seconds of listening to Star Commander to be sold. Their debut album “The World Was Sinking & I Was Hardly Surprised” opens with one of the nicer guitar riffs I’ve heard recently, but don’t let your guard down: this isn’t bland vanilla rock. Sure, “Leave Her In America” shares a chord progression with Chairlift‘s “Bruises”, but that is precisely where the similarities end. To the latter’s whispery boy-girl vocals, Star Commander offer screaming MTA (that’s Male Teenage Angst, by the way). Where Chairlift whip out a subtle drum-machine, Star Commander bash a kit really hard. They’re so loud, the mic has to be placed at the opposite end of the room. At least, I’m assuming that’s the explanation.
There’s one thing that I do have to clear up right here at the outset. If you’ve had a cheeky listen to the tracks below, you might know what’s coming. There’s no pussy-footing around it: singer Christian Medrano sounds a lot like Conor Oberst. There we go.
You’d be wrong to think Star Commander are just a Bright Eyes rip-off, though. For starters, they have a rather less self-indulgent sense of humour. Have a quick read of their Last.fm bio, as an example. I have it on good authority that the Fort Worth threesome are not actually clones of Conor, but they are level-headed enough to be able to make a joke about it. What really tickled me, though, was their Facebook profile, where they sum up their roles as “Ryan Schefsky – lead drums; Christian Medrano – lead vocals, lead guitar; Donovan Ford – lead bass”. Surely I’m not the only person who laughed at that moment in Spinal Tap, right?
I suppose I should actually talk about the music. Alongside Nebraska’s finest, they have a touch of Regina Spektor to them. Don’t believe me? Have a listen to “When The End Comes” below. Now listen to Regina’s “On The Radio“. Now back to “When The End Comes”. Notice a similarity? Let me be clear, here: this is a very good thing as far as I’m concerned. They also claim the influence of The Lemonheads and Leonard Cohen. I can definitely hear one of those, but I leave it to you to work out which (hint: not the one famous for singing “Suzanne”).
At times they sway into emo territory – you’ll notice because Christian starts to sound less like Conor and more like Cursive‘s Tim Kasher – but they’re too clearly having fun for it to grate. You certainly can’t fault them for labouring things: the album consists of eight tracks, and clocks in at a little over thirty minutes. That’s not to say it sounds lightweight or flimsy – on the contrary, it punches well above it’s weight. In fact, it’s a great example of the benefits of ruthlessly trimming filler tracks.
For me, the highlight is “Daddy”. It’s not the quickest to build, but that just makes the chorus all the more enjoyable. And that guitar squeal at 1:27? Yeah, that was cool.
If my sources are correct, Star Commander have just finished up a little tour with The Please & Thank Yous, which hopefully means there’ll be some more material on its way. In the meantime, you can check out some select picks below, or head over to Bandcamp for the whole album.
Connect with Star Commander – Facebook | MySpace | Bandcamp | Last.fm
Star Commander – “Leave Her In America”
Star Commander – “When The End Comes”
Star Commander – “Daddy”
