The Thin Man

CD - Spectres

Play 90 second soundbite of 'Optimist's Blues' @ 'CD quality'

'Spectres' by Chicago's The Thin Man is a piece of pure rockin' folk escapism, a steamy, booze drenched trip through an urban landscape scattered with graffiti scrawl and littered with the jetsam of modern city survival. If you like 'dark', 'Spectres' can be dark. If you want 'real', 'Spectres' is real. If you are looking for 'different', 'Spectres' is simply something else! The Thin Man take on the musical establishment and come out smelling pretty damn sweet!!

The Thin Man don't do rock or folk in the true sense of the words, The Thin Man have a completely different take on what modern music should sound like. Here with 'Spectres' we are served a beautifully droll portion of Thin Man poetic ramblings set to brash soundscapes that are, at times, discordant, often juxtaposed, but always intoxicating. With wonderfully drooled out lyrics that sound like a comin' together of a whiskey soaked Tom Waits and a mind-altered Nick Cave, The Thin Man deliver their goods with complete disregard for the listener's sensibility and susceptibility to aural stimulation. No, The Thin Man isn't gonna be to everyone's taste; 'Spectres' is brash and angular, obtuse and tangential. 'Spectres' is a positive mind-fuck of urban, raw edged folk music with earthy blues undercurrents driven by lazy rockin' grooves. The end product is an unashamedly raw but sensitive compilation of melancholy poetic wares set to jangly, nightmare inducing, pounding industrial backdrops.

The Thin Man play with grit and determined honesty which gives 'Spectres' a grubby but wholesome feel quite unlike most of their contemporaries. The Thin Man take a hard road to musical heaven; they pass-by indie normality and ignore commercial banality to give their combined all to their innovative brand of urban-folk/gutter-rock. 'Spectres' by The Thin Man makes a very pleasant and pretty challenging change from the more obvious and less rewarding kinda indie trash out there at the moment. The Thin Man take a gamble on their sordid brand of contemporary music - for me, the gamble came in with decent odds and the losers are the more traditional pop-rock combos who should look up at the Thin Man on their winner's podium and be thankful that they might have just learned something that they can take away and think about.

'Spectres' by The Thin Man is a real blast and should do well in the cultish sectors of the music buying public. And, don't you just wish that more artists would take a trip down 'Different Street' al la The Thin Man - surely the music world would be a better and more rewarding place for it!! Tasty, very very tasty!!

A - Z Selector

Re-start Site