Quantcast

Call for Music Critics and Music Bloggers

Music
cover art

Sugarplum Fairies

The Images We Get

(Starfish Records; US: 12 Apr 2011; UK: 12 Apr 2011)

A breathy, engaging little triumph

Paradox can be a powerful thing. The combination of hushed female vocals over jingling, poppy guitars is not exactly new, but Sugarplum Fairies (bad band name alert!) do it well. The poppy bounce of “Plastic Sky” is irresistible, and well served by Silvia Ryder’s breathy singing. The band has more than one trick in its bag, however. Down-tempo tunes like “Heart Hell” and “The Images We Get” rub elbows with energetic workouts like “One Trick Pony” and “Jump the Gun”. Ryder indulges in plenty of Mazzy Star-style longing and sliding off the note, but acoustic strummers like “Moth” show a little more verve than that band ever managed. The accordion undertow in album closer “96 Dreams” manages to be at once unexpected and perfectly placed.


Is The Images We Get groundbreaking? Hardly. Engaging, toe-tapping, and fun? Yes, yes and yes.

Rating:

DAVID MAINE is a novelist and essayist. His books include The Preservationist (2004), Fallen (2005), The Book of Samson (2006) and Monster, 1959 (2008). He has contributed to The Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, Esquire.com and NPR.com, among other outlets. He is a lifelong music obsessive whose interests range from rock to folk to hip-hop to international to blues. He currently lives in Honolulu, Hawaii, where he teaches at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. Catch up with his blog, The Party Never Stops, at davidmaine.blogspot.com, or become his buddy on Facebook (or better yet, Google+) to keep up with reviews and other developments.


Related Articles
Comments
Now on PopMatters
Call for Music Critics and Music Bloggers (Announcements) [Tue, 3:00 pm]
Bone and Bell Release Second EP (Mixed Media) [Tue, 10:00 am]
Cannes 2012: Day 9 - 'Student' + 'In the Fog' (Notes from the Road) [Tue, 9:00 am]
The 10 Greatest Aspects of the 'Star Wars' Franchise (Short Ends and Leader) [Tue, 8:00 am]
Devil May Cry: HD Collection (Reviews) [Tue, 6:45 am]
The Walkmen: Heaven (Reviews) [Tue, 2:00 am]
  1. The Top 10 Overplayed Songs You Hate by Artists You Love (Sound Affects)
  2. Tea with 'Sherlock': Investigating the Investigators (Features)
  3. Sunk? This 'Battleship' Stunk! (Short Ends and Leader)
  4. Tenacious D: Rize of the Fenix (Reviews)
  5. Top Ten Lost Midwest Punk Singles (Sound Affects)
  6. Like 'Doom', In Heels (Moving Pixels)
  7. 10 Pieces of Cinematic Art That Require Revisiting (Short Ends and Leader)
  8. Punk Rock's Pet Sounds: An Interview with Bomb the Music Industry! (Features)
  9. She's a Rainbow: A Tribute to Donna Summer (Features)
  10. Counterbalance No. 82: U2's 'Achtung Baby' (Sound Affects)
  11. 'Albatross': A Not-So-Weighty Coming-of-Age Meets Mid-Life-Crisis Film (Reviews)
  12. Counterbalance No. 83: The Stooges' 'Fun House' (Sound Affects)
  13. We Will Avenge Them Or… Be Avenged?: The Individual in the US Experience (Features)
  14. The Queen and Her Crayons: An Interview With Donna Summer (Features)
  15. The Best Canadian Records of the Year? The Fun Agony of Voting for the Polaris Prize Long List (Sound Affects)
  16. Killer Mike: R.A.P. Music (Reviews)
  17. Flash Points: Mommy's Breast, Marriage Equality and Why Chipotle Is King (Features)
  18. Sherlock Holmes, Dirk Gently and the Case of the Eccentric Detective (Columns)
  19. Sergio Leone: Something to Do with Death (Columns)
  20. Early Summer 2012 New Music Playlist (Mixed Media)
  21. The 10 Greatest Aspects of the 'Star Wars' Franchise (Short Ends and Leader)
  22. In Support of Supports (Moving Pixels)
  23. Flash Points: Chicks, Sluts and Facebook (Features)
  24. In Defense Of... Rock Radio: A Force in Popular Culture (Columns)
  25. The Cult: Choice of Weapon (Reviews)
  26. Garbage: Not Your Kind of People (Reviews)
  27. Saint Etienne: Words and Music (Reviews)
  28. Willie Nelson: Heroes (Reviews)
  29. 'People's Pornography': The Mundanities of Pornography and Surveillance Culture (Reviews)
  30. Feeling '80s Spirit: Post-Hardcore Punk for the Plastic Generation (Columns)
PM Picks
Music Archive
Announcements

© 1999-2012 PopMatters.com. All rights reserved.
PopMatters.com™ and PopMatters™ are trademarks
of PopMatters Media, Inc.

PopMatters is wholly independently owned and operated.
PopMatters is a member of BUZZMEDIA Music, MOG and Guardian Select.