No Hits 12.5.05

Pageantry - Fan Modine

I'll never understand why some bands find an audience and very similar music made by equally talented artists struggles for the smallest amount of attention. Take Fan Modine. Though the beautiful album Homeland (US, UK) traffics as expertly in theatrical orch-pop as Magnetic Fields and Jens Lekman and displays the same wit and wistfulness of Belle & Sebastian and The Lucksmiths, it got trampled in the dust by all the kids rushing to grab whatever it is they bought in 2004--The Arcade Fire or Fiery Furnaces or something. "Pageantry" is an extremely charming number in which a skipping drum machine beat corrals lush strings and horns and the slightly world weary vocals of Gordon Zacharias. It could be an outtake from 69 Love Songs (US, UK), except the singing's better and Zacharias (Fan Modine's mostly a one-man vision) tackles his material with greater sincerity, less ambivalence.

Though he's been something of a wanderer over the past decade, Zacharias recently settled in Carrboro, North Carolina, where he's assembled a band that includes Ash Bowie (Polvo). They're working on a third Fan Modine album.

Waiting In the Wings - Fan Modine

Epitaph For My Heart - Magnetic Fields

Julie - Jens Lekman

Sunlight In a Jar - The Lucksmiths