by Charles Davis
Somewhere, sometime, in some backward conceptual reality, located in a distant corner within the greater multiverse, there exists a place where The Pixies were Nirvana (because The Velvet Underground were The Beatles [because Carthage was Rome, etc]), and the world relished in an abundance of interpersonal growth and self reflection. Our warrior-poet legend (and mythos) running abundant across a landscape of fiercely selfless, compassionate strength, and an exceptional code of truth-love above all else, standing supreme in the character arc of existence. Such is born this parallel reality that bestowed upon us the delicate nuance of April Magazine, and their release, as one would say, If The Ceiling Were A Kite Vol. 1.
Abruptly upfront and in your face, with fragility in its lo-fi-ness, this is the aura of a 90's-era local club band that laced up a Tascam 4-track for a series of cassettes to be sold at their (always amazing) shows. Maybe you've owned this cassette for years, there and back again, and you out of the blue rendezvous upon it one day through a collection of meetings enjoyed with old friends, and, perhaps, new associates (if the stars align). The music is rich, anciently fresh, maybe altogether timeless, at least in its ability to capture a certain presence - an aesthetic dripped in honesty and the fruits of happy moments. What memories might be hashed in with a time of more relative freedom (although you couldn't enjoy it at the time), surface in the emotional reaction, none-the-less.
Its guitar, its bass, its drums, its VOX, its rock'n'roll as we once knew and can once again know it (if only we let ourselves). A computer's nightmare where the lighting shines down in exhilarating fashion, controlled by the divine energy circulating through our (your) inner light. Lo-fi, guitar-ish, cassette, analogousness, tangibility, humanity, crushing reality, wholesome genuinity, eclectic presentability, hilariously pretentious, seriously pognant, yesterday tomorrow today. For an album representing a mood so familiarly intangible/ tangibly unfamiliar, gracias, April Magazine.