ethan durelle- White Knuckles on Turned Wheels

Tyler Baber [Decapolis Music Staff]; Age: 19; Top 5 bands: Starflyer 59, Pedro the Lion, Havalina, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Joan of Arc Musical preferences: I like music that makes me feel, anything that evokes a strong emotion is good to me. Likewise anything that sounds fresh or original will get an enthusiastic listen. Lyrics are as important as talented musicianship.

What do you get when you cross four guys, "progressive indie rock," and Texas? Probably the same thing you get when you cross four guys with prog-indie from any state but I have this thing with Texas, a sort of love-hate relationship. I'm a big fan of most indie I've heard coming out of Texas but I'm no fan of the Texas-style nationalism that rivals the nazis in fervor and allegiance. It's a big flat dusty state, what is there to be proud of?

The music, for one thing. Even when four Texans start a band that sounds like it'll just be one big trend hopper, with influences like Sunny Day Real Estate and At The Drive-In, it sounds better than bands with the same influences from most other states. All my anti-Texan rhetoric is no match for the musical craftings of ethan durelle, whose debut album White Knuckles On Turned Wheels is available now on Esotype Records.

I want so badly to talk trash about ethan durelle simply because I'm so tired of two things: 1) Texans (but we've discussed that) and 2) albums released as "progressive indie rock commonly shuffled in with the new emo label" by bands with influences so much like all the other indie bands out there. There really isn't anything that distinguishes ethan durelle from all of the other bands in category number two except for the fact that the boys in the aforementioned group are good at what they do. Better than most new groups like them, as good as any of the groups at the forefront of the now overcooked prog-indie-emo genre.

The lyrics and music on tracks like "I Get Shot in Every Film I'm In" and "Accidental Killers" are potent enough to allow the listener to look past clichés in form and style and accept the songs at face value as well-fashioned vignettes. One gets the sense that this group doesn't take their music so seriously as to come off as rock star jerks but they respect what they're doing enough to sound more mature than all the mainstremo nonsense that's so popular these days.

The real problem with White Knuckles on Turned Wheels is the production. While most of ethan durelle's peers sound overproduced and under-practiced, ethan durelle is the exact opposite. In a musical world where any knucklehead with money to burn can use Pro Tools to add talent where none could be found before this album is musically strong and filled with soft fuzz and production cut backs.

If you only buy one to three albums this year, make it/them the new albums by the Blood Brothers, Starflyer 59 and/or Radiohead. If you only buy one prog-emo-indie album that, had it been released at the beginning of the emo-invasion would have been as big as any Clarity or The Moon is Down, make it White Knuckles on Turned Wheels. Don't mess with Texas.

Grade: B-