Sheer – “Stutter”

Sheer – “Stutter”

From The Native Sound:

A year and a half since the release of their debut album, and two member changes later, Sheer are back.

With their new EP Psychic Quarry, Sheer embrace a change that finds the band at their most relaxed and inspired. While their debut LP Uneasy introduced the band as one with a kinship for dreamy, reverb-induced soundscapes, Psychic Quarry is a much more catchy, and indie rock-informed affair.

The six songs on Psychic Quarry cover a lot of ground – feelings of anxiety and depression, the vulnerability of intimacy, and even the post-election shock many of found ourselves coping with.

Stutter isn’t a single. I don’t know that it’s really a thing to share here in this space. I really like this band. Psychic Quarry is a great record. It came out back in April, and I probably should have talked about it then.

Anyway, go grab the damn thing.

Sheer
The Native Sound

YEAR END! – Top Records Of 2015

trbestof

I’m keeping this list brief this year. Not too many bells and whistles, or whatever. It’s the end of January, so I really need to just post it. 2015 was a weird fucking year, and I didn’t keep up with this stuff the way I should have. 2016 should be better. Anyway, on with the list.

Top Records of 2015. LPs, EPs, and splits. In alphabetical order:

Adult Mom – “Momentary Lapse Of Happily”
Annabel – “Having It All”
Beach House – “Depression Cherry”
Big Awesome – “Party On”
Blind Mice – “Sunday Songs”
Bong Mountain – “You’re Doin’ Great”
Drowse – “Soon Asleep”
Football, etc. – “Disappear”
Haybaby – “Sleepy Kids”
Island Of Misfit Toys – “I Made You Something”
Jennylee – “Right On!”
Kindling – “Galaxies”
King Woman – “Doubt”
Kind Of Like Spitting / Warren Franklin & The Founding Fathers – “It’s Always Nice To See You”
Long Knives – “This Is Your Life”
mewithoutYou – “Pale Horses”
Pet Symmetry – “Pet Hounds”
Sheer – “Uneasy”
The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die – “Harmlessness”
The Unlovables / Dirt Bike Annie – “Reunion Show”
Waxahatchee – “Ivy Tripp”

REVIEW: Sheer – “Uneasy”

sheeruneasy

One of the downsides to being a shitty 30 year old is that I remember the 90s. This has made the latest trend of bands playing 90’s alternative influenced music a bit challenging. It’s music I’m hyper familiar with, as it was music I grew up with. I definitely have blindspots, but those have been filled in over the years. Bands like Sheer are really interesting to me. I see what they are doing, and it hits all the marks I want to see a band hit. They manage to take influence without being derivative and repetitive.

Coming strong right out the gate, Sheer play shoegaze/dream pop filtered through fuzzy alternative. There are similarities to bands like Lush and Galaxie 500. There is some Jesus And Mary Chain and The Breeders in there too. They take those influences and put their own heart behind it. Uneasy, as a record, is a great melding of the past and the present. But, that is really a roundabout way of describing sound. More simply, there is a great mixture of dense, thick guitars and more delicate, melodic ones. The guitar never gets too heavy on the old shoegaze shimmer. The sound is more reverb/distortion heavy than it is clean and swirling. Outside of that, there aren’t too many additional effects being used. “Orion” is probably the best example of things. The songs has a very powerful and dense build, it then hits a very melodic tone. The song shifts between the two extremes in a really great way. The vocals are also a strong selling point to me. Gina Almaguer has a great voice, and she can shift from strong/clear to the more genre standard “ethereal” vocals pretty seamlessly.

Sheer needs to get a lot of credit for making such a well worn genre sound crisp and clear. Gina Almaguer and Sean Sakamoto absolutely nail things on the guitar front. Anthony Quintero on bass and Jules Leon on drums keep everything on point and driving along. Uneasy is a record that shows a band working as a cohesive unit to make music that can get a bit loose and messy in less knowledgeable hands.

This is a record that has endless appeal to fans of all kinds of music. It takes a little from alternative, indie, shoegaze, and classic left-of-the-dial bands. It’s great, don’t sleep on it.

Sheer
The Native Sound
Bandcamp
Buy It