February 10, 2009
Schwervon! | Low Blow
FRESH BAKED
Schwervon!
Low Blow
2009 | Olive Juice Music
A-
Below Houston, there is still one building that looks like the New York I heard about and saw on TV as a kid. Obviously very lived-in, the building that houses local rock duo Schwervon! is decrepit, but not misused. No, trudge up the stairs to guitarist Matt Roth and drummer Nan Turner’s apartment (which also houses Olive Juice Music, the record label and recording studio Roth helms) and you’ll see a space that has been enthusiastically enjoyed by a great many independent thinkers over the last few decades.
Roth and Turner have lived on the L.E.S. since their building was the norm and not yet the anomaly, and maybe that’s why their music has always felt to me like a throwback to the best bands of the mid 90’s. On Low Blow, their fourth long-player and first since 2006’s excellent I Dream Of Teeth, Roth and Turner give nods to The Rentals, Archers of Loaf, Hum and even early Ween (mostly in mid-song de-tuning on opener “Dodger”). Schwervon!’s minimal sound-just guitar and drums-never sounds thin, thanks in large part to their clever maximization of what’s at hand. Roth’s guitar is tuned low to flesh out the bottom end, cranked loud, and played in a style that’s somewhere between lead and rhythm. Like an indie rock Merle Travis, Roth’s melodies are simultaneously intricate and simple, on most prominent display in “Lucky Rocks’“ one note leads and “Jad Fair”’s deliberate, determined strum. Nan Turner’s drumming has evolved in spades over the last few years: where on earlier albums the rhythm was strictly rudimentary, the drumming on Low Blow sounds very mapped-out. Not in a math rock way – Turner isn’t Neil Peart, but reminds me of Janet Weiss on the last Sleater-Kinney album. “Dodger” and “Cut It Down” are both very tom-heavy, putting an extra little boom below Roth’s guitar.
Of course, Schwervon!’s secret has weapon has always been their proximity. Two songwriters who share a life offstage as well as on, Roth and Turner’s vocals intertwine with an unforced familiarity that comes from years of cohabitation and collaboration. Roth, the Kansas drawl undiminished by years in the city, has always sounded to me like the voice of reason, a narrator, while Turner’s bubbly (but never ditzy) alto serves as more of an atmosphere enhancer: more of a third instrument than what drives the lyric. On Low Blow, though, Schwervon! have really come together, often singing in unison or falling into a singsong-y, call and response. Lead single “Balloon” works so well because Roth and Turner are clearly enjoying each other’s company in the dance party-friendly verses, and in mimicking the between-verse lead guitar. Schwervon!’s music is comprised of two-person inside jokes that cruises on a wave of inclusiveness: sort of like Matt and Kim, Nan and Matt make their audience feel like the songs and the sound belong to everyone who comes across it.
Low Blow flows with a cohesiveness that makes the whole record feel like one big song. Interspersed dialogue between the two, on tracks, “What We Talk About When We Don’t Talk About Love,” and “The Profile Doesn’t Fit the Profile,” bolsters the feeling that the audience is part of the band, and vice versa. Roth and Turner sound thrilled to have ended up together, and their enthusiasm is infectious. Low Blow, not as dark as I Dream Of Teeth, but not as instantly accessible as 2004’s Poseur, is an excellent introduction for the new Schwervon! fan, and the next logical extension for the longtime follower.
by Brook Pridemore
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