REVIEW: BY THE END OF TONIGHT / O PIONEERS!!! – SWEET JUNK

(OH SNAP TWO FER TUESDAY!)
Gotta love Team Science Records. I mean, if you wanna talk about a seriously below the radar local label that is putting out a slew of seven inch gold, this is the one. It’s the record-releasing arm of i heart you productions, and they already have one of our current favorites, the Papermoons debut, in their catalog, along with releases by The Jonbenet and bands from other zip codes. Oh, and on their forthcoming list? A little something from Golden Axe. YUSS.

This split's title, Sweet Junk, implies a pair of throw away b-sides; THINK AGAIN. We’ll start with O Pioneers!!! “I-10”, in which Eric I Heart You sounds, well, about as thrilled as someone stuck in Katy Freeway traffic. With their trademark disdain for the low end, OP pulls to the side of road, shouting and throwing gravel at passers by, who no doubt do more freaking out than loosing cool at the sight of it. Bluetooth headsets are falling all over the place as frantic hands wind up open windows as the guitar weaves in an out of the same part of the spectrum as the cymbals, its cold jangle taking a back-seat to the fury of the vocals. The result is the impact of the song as a whole, rather than any hook or riff – a giant orange plastic barrel full of salt and water and likely to pummel you only less slightly than concrete.

On the flip, By The End of Tonight’s "I Love Technology, I Love You To” finds you in a place of slightly less fury, but the flurry is there like a tour van in a blizzard. Foreshadowing the breakthrough in both sound and composition that will follow later in the year (and later this week) on their split with Tera Malos, this song shows why BTEOT are the peerless masters of instrumental dynamicism in this town. It’s not that they stop and turn on a dime or the ability build up the tension/volume/bigness of it all that gives them this crown, but how they are able to combine the two and string together an avalanche of totally whips (and often thrown away!) parts in such a short space of time. It’s like a movie then – you couldn’t quote the whole thing, but you know all the good lines; and this narrative has tons of em.