Rogue Wave - Out Of TheShadow

Fri 30th Jul, 2004 in Music Reviews

Zach Rogue has got it. It’s the X-Factor – that rare, indefinable gift for constructing intensely infectious melodies. He wrote this album, as the press release says, after being faced with ‘the sort of existential crisis unique to the newly unemployed.’ Somehow I don’t think unemployment is responsible for giving Rogue his deft melodic touch, but the existential crisis has obviously worked wonders. This is an album of beautiful moments and lush choruses.

 

The album kicks off with Every Moment, sounding like the Beach Boys circa Pet Sounds jamming with The Shins. The driving, perpetually flitting melodies sweep through the track, the notes swooning over one another. The structure is seemingly loose, but the melodic and thematic leitmotifs of the song are so strong that the nigh-schizophrenia of the tempo and instruments works a treat. The chorus is almost too lovely to listen to: ‘I used to think about you and me together…‘

 

Nourishment Nation starts off with acoustic guitar, the richness of the production highlighted by the distinct notes of the chords. Chimes come in to the picture. The Shins-similarity is obvious, but the production is richer, more buxom.

 

The entire album is intensely evocative…a walk in a park on an Autumn day, the leaves falling, the feather-touch of a hand on yours, someone’s lips turning in to a smile. This is the soundtrack to the picnic of your dreams, and the birds chirping on Be Kind – Remind only serve to help the feeling. If it wasn’t so cold outside, I’d head out to the backyard right now, pull up a chair, pop open a beer and lie around listening to Out Of The Shadow right now.

 

Postage Stamp World deals with the existential, familial, relationship angst of Ben Gibbard’s (Death Cab For Cutie / Postal Service) better lyrics. The refrain of ‘you can all get in line / and lick my behind’ is a dubious pun, but the verse lyrics and the music are so lovely it’s hard to care.

 

This is a marvellous album that expresses the liquidity of emotions and feelings divinely, backed by beautiful music with serene melodies. It’s water flowing, it’s trees blowing in the breeze, it’s lying in the sun. It’s melancholy, it’s hope, it’s forgotten memories.

 

If you’re in to Oh, Inverted World by the Shins or Pet Sounds by The Beach Boys or the Photo Album by Death Cab For Cutie, go and buy this album right now lest you miss out on such an intensely wonderful effort. Scratch that. If you’re in to really good music, buy this.