You know that Carl Sandburg poem that gave Chicago its nickname as the “City of the Broad Shoulders”? The one where he calls it the “hog butcher of the world” and “tool maker, stacker of wheat.” Yeh, Carl Sandburg should rise from his grave to revise that (wonderful) poem with: “spaced out, scuzz rock producer of the planet”: Plastic Crimewave Sound, anything Alex White is involved in, Vee Dee, Nones, Smith Westerns, and eh, I'm sure I'm forgetting ten other bands (sorry dudes).
Another name to add to the list is Disappears. Their debut record is about to come out on Kranky, and I'm saying we bump to the top of the “best of Chicago” list for two reasons:
01 Brian Case (formerly of) 90 Day Men is in this band. I thought 90 Day Men were one of the best under-looked bands of the last fifteen years, but I'm glad that another member of the group –aside from Robert Lowe– has gone onto doing something I like. In this case, Case has moved on from proggy post-rock, and into different realms.
02 Disappears sounds like Hawkwind meets The Pagans. Meaning this sounds like shit punk that dropped out on a bunch of bad acid, or like a bunch of dudes who wanted to be Flipper, but were too good at playing their instruments. In some weird cases, there are some moments on this album where I suspect Disappears of being the Midwestern cousin of Wooden Shjips. Since I thought the Shjips album, Dos, was the best of 2009, I'm pretty sure this album will stay on my turntable for a good many months.
