by Sean Fennell (@seanrfennell)
Pool Holograph are not a new band, but they’re not a particularly old one either. What started as a bedroom project for frontperson Wyatt Grant has since evolved into a full band effort, adding layers to their brand of off-kilter indie rock. Which is why, perhaps, they come off as a band mired in transition, a middle-ground that frustratingly holds back their latest effort, Love Touched Time and Time Began To Sweat. Long-winded name aside, I quite like this record, but it is in that fondness I find myself most frustrated, as they bump up against great so consistently only to arrive ultimately at pretty good.
The heart of this sonic conflict seems to lie in whether Pool Holograph truly wish to embrace rollicking post-punk or to remain a more insular, intimate project. Tracks like “Figure and Ground,” where noodly guitar lines weave together like a bowl of spaghetti, seem ready to embrace the former. That is, it would, if the song reached the kind of crescendo the build-up seems to suggest. “Deliverance” on the other hand, does not shy away from capital R rock, Grant’s vocals battling for space within its waterfall of droney riffs, creating one of the more even songs of the record.
It’s when Love Touch Time and Time Began To Sweat reaches too far toward it’s delicate and spacey tendencies that it begins to lose focus. Much of this could be attributed to faulty sequencing, as the record is front loaded with energy only to become bogged down in uneven episodes of found sound and almost filmscore lethargy. Perhaps if these moments were treated more as act-breaks between Pool Holograph’s more energizing singles, the impressive aspects would better shine through.
Where it all truly comes together, is with “Medieval Heart”. This is the record, and the band, at its best; the slippery momentum, carbonated vocals and gyrating rhythm section all culminate with the positively Malkmus-esque coda. It’s a sweet spot they flirt with a few times - “Mirror World” with its whispered vocals and the spindly “For Years” to name a few - but never so directly. Much of what makes these fleeting moments so effective are how they bring together the records more disparate qualities. Of course, unfortunately, they serve to highlight just what doesn’t work about some of the record.