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God of Malfunction

Marc A. Price — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:38:45 +0000

The Contrast’s sixth full-length album ‘God of Malfunction’ sees the band going into ‘wide-screen’ mode with their most creative and ambitious work. The band has always enhanced their core sound on record with vintage keyboards, percussion, and special FX. However, The Contrast is much bolder on the new album, allowing the songs to feature “whatever ‘they’ demanded”. Cello, theremin, mellotron, treated electric piano & Eno-esque ambient textures appear alongside the ebow, classic organs, and grand piano that the band has always used in the studio to augment their core Rickenbacker-heavy live sound. The Contrast worked closely with executive producer Little Steven on God Of Malfunction. His arrangements and production suggestions were invaluable to the completion of the album. The result sounds completely and unmistakably like The Contrast, only this time in full 3-D. Pre-order CD: http://www.wickedcoolrecords.com/shop/bands/the-contrast/contrast-god-of-malfunction-cd.html Pre-order Download only: http://www.wickedcoolrecords.com/shop/bands/the-contrast/the-contrast-god-of-malfunction-album-download.html Track List:

Underground Ghosts

Coming Back To Life

Take Me Apart

I Am An Alien

Gone Forever

God of Malfunction

Good Luck Charms

Better Than They Seem

She's A Disaster

Thought You Were Strong

Unexpected

False Admission

The Contrast – “Coming Back to Life” (Digital Single)

Marc A. Price — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 11:32:27 +0000

“Coming Back To Life” is the first single from the The Contrast’s sixth full-length album ‘God of Malfunction.’ The new album sees the band going into ‘wide-screen’ mode with their most creative and ambitious work. The band has always enhanced their core sound on record with vintage keyboards, percussion, and special FX. However, The Contrast is much bolder on the new album, allowing the songs to feature “whatever ‘they’ demanded”. Cello, theremin, mellotron, treated electric piano & Eno-esque ambient textures appear alongside the ebow, classic organs, and grand piano that the band has always used in the studio to augment their core Rickenbacker-heavy live sound. Hear it in the player below

http://www.wickedcoolrecords.com/shop/bands/the-contrast/the-contrast-coming-back-to-life-digital-single.html

Perfect Disguise: Introducing the Contrast

Marc A. Price — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 09:22:57 +0000

While the Contrast haven’t moved enough merchandise either at home in the U.K. or across the pond in the States to truly merit a “greatest-hits” album, Little Steven Van Zandt is enough of a fan to think they deserve one anyway, and one or two spins of Perfect Disguise: Introducing the Contrast, compiled for Van Zandt’s Wicked Cool Records label, is enough to convince nearly anyone that the guy has a valid point. Featuring choice cuts from the Contrast’s first five albums, Perfect Disguise is a near-perfect amalgamation of jangle pop melodies, indie rock attitude, and new wave guitar heroics (if Tom Verlaine and Peter Buck had a baby, the kid would play a lot like Contrast brainchild David Reid). These 14 songs don’t exactly shy away from the band’s obvious influences, but the energy and power of the group’s attack are fresh and invigorating, and “Caught in a Trap,” “Believe,” and “Disconnected” really do sound like hit singles, with irresistible hooks and choruses to die for. It’s arguable if this collection really needed two versions of both “Mystery” and “Perfect Disguise,” but the songs show enough variety in electric and acoustic form to show just how strong these tunes are and that they can take on different shapes and still shine brightly. Most fans of smart pop and contemporary garage rock probably aren’t all that familiar with the Contrast (at least not in the United States), and Perfect Disguise is an ideal introduction to a fine, woefully underrated band that truly delivers the goods. Review: All Music Perfect Disguise: Introducing the Contrast (Wicked Cool Records, 2007)

Mystery1 (Acoustic)

Disconnected

Big Dark Nowhere

Ansaphone

How To Tell

Believe

Perfect Disguise (Acoustic)

Perfect Disguise

George Zipp

Caught In A Trap

Can't Stand The Light

World's So Different

Unfair Game

Mask

Mystery1

Underground Ghosts

Marc A. Price — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 09:49:39 +0000

Underground Ghosts (Rainbow Quartz, 2007) The Contrast are often advertised as power pop, but there’s a dark, cutting seriousness of intention here that skirts that designation, along with a sort of unspecifically ’60s-influenced approach to what they do. (They telegraph ’60s intentions in the broad way that the Smithereens did before them, without truly drawing a straight and direct musical correlation to any specific band or movement.) This is straight-ahead, full-bore rock, fraught with an almost grim seriousness, from the fatalistic groove of “Pocketful of Fear” to the melodic pummel and psychedelic guitar break of “Believe.” Nevertheless, there’s a missed connection here that keeps Underground Ghosts from being a great album (despite hyperbole-fraught accolades from Little Steven Van Zandt, via his Underground Garage radio show, wherein he proclaimed them “One of the best bands on the planet…and England too”). The seriousness and grim drive on this LP often cross that line into obtuseness and repetitiveness. In intention, the English group most accurately call to mind their countrymen and predecessors (from the late ’80s and early ’90s) the Godfathers. Here was another group with gutsy, ’60s drive and a bold-voiced singer that had many appealing trappings yet something missing that kept them from greatness. The best song here is “My Peace of Mind,” with its Davie Allan-like guitar buzz, chiming leads, and carnivalesque organ. Review from AllMusic.com

Everyone's a Sucker

My Peace of Mind

I've Known Your Name Forever

What Do I Know

Pocketful of Fear

Clue

Blast off in Primetime

Something Isn't Right

Breaking Promises and Hearts

Shine

Believe

The World of Being Wrong

Forget to Tell the Time

Marc A. Price — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 10:13:06 +0000

Forget to Tell the Time (Rainbow Quartz, 2005) With their fourth and best album, Peterborough, England’s the Contrast roll out 14 tunes that pay tribute to 1980s college radio icons like the Smithereens and R.E.M. with spirit, talent, and conviction. The fiery “Caught in a Trap” charges forth with the melodic gifts of singer/songwriter/guitarist David Reid, but the three-part harmonies of “Forget to Tell the Time” and the Kinks-on-steroids thump of “Different Again” are just gateways to mid-album keepers like the contagious, simple pop of “Someone Else’s Logo,” the Costello-like blues/jazz crawl of “Hold Your Fire,” and the bittersweet, Rickenbacker-steered “Ink.” Embraced by Little Steven on his Underground Garage radio show for good reason, these gents keep it tight and interesting. An exceptional effort, Forget to Tell the Time finds the Contrast coming in clear and in Technicolor. Review from allmusic.com

Caught In A Trap

Forget To Tell The Time

Different Again

Ink

Adversity

Side fx

Mean

Someone else's Logo

Hold Your Fire

Care

Big Dark Nowhere

Trying To Fill The Space

What Have You Done

Be There

Fade Back In

Marc A. Price — Mon, 12 Jul 2004 10:09:29 +0000

Fade Back In (Rainbow Quartz, 2004) Like Reckoning-era R.E.M., the Contrast invoke rural landscapes where lovers weep over fieldstones and leathery farmers listen to Big Star. Frontman David Reid rolls out streams of pop culture references and wistful romantic angst in an often impenetrable English drawl that owes as much to Tenpole Tudor as it does Michael Stipe. On the Contrast‘s third release for the U.K. indie Rainbow Quartz, the Peterborough jangle pop quartet expounds on the brooding, guitar-driven sound of 2002′s Wireless Days with a winning combination of punchy rave-ups (“Catch the Spark”) and hook-filled road songs (“Give Me One More Chance”). Comparisons to Television and Material Issue are apt, but this time around the group leans more toward the angular attack of Spoon and the ’60s melodicism of the Smithereens. Fade Back In resonates with the steely confidence of local boys in their milieu, and psychedelic flourishes like the backwards guitar breakdown on “You’re Starring Role” and the serpentine chord changes on “Disconnected” show a band that’s beginning to come into its own. Review from allmusic.com

Give Me One More Chance

George Zipp

Forget It

The Guilty Party

Catch The Spark

Your Starring Role

Functional Punk Pop Song

Something Tells Me

Flatpacked

Smart

Everything Seems To Get To Me

Disconnected

Wireless Days

Marc A. Price — Mon, 11 Nov 2002 10:21:10 +0000

Wireless Days (Rainbow Quartz, 2002) The Contrast’s second album is less derivative than their debut; singer-songwriter David Reid has synthesized his various influences — from Television and the Stranglers to Miles Davis and the Shadows – into something more his own. In some ways, this makes Wireless Days a more consistent listen than the spottier Mystery No. 1. Unfortunately, however, while that album’s weak spots are missing here, its high points were much higher than what’s on Wireless Days. There are no genuinely bad songs on this album, but even the best of the batch (the dramatic “Drop Dead Gorgeous Love Song” and the jangle-poppy single “Can’t Stand the Light”) are as slight and sugary as meringue, and many of the others are insubstantial to the point that it’s difficult to remember them once the album is over. Between Reid‘s pleasant but anonymous vocals and the vaguely pretty tunes, the Contrast sound like anonymous late-’80s Brit-poppers the Mighty Lemon Drops retooled for the new millennium. review from allmusic.com

Can't Stand The Light

Wireless Days

Fortune

Mask

What You Want

Unfair Game

Charlie Grey

Drop Dead Gorgeous Love Song

Late Train

Cover

Elvis Fix

Mystery #1

Marc A. Price — Mon, 23 Apr 2001 10:16:24 +0000

Mystery #1 (Rainbow Quartz, 2000)
The Contrast offers up a lot with this ambitious first major releaseMystery #1, only now getting North American distribution, two years after its original UK debut. The best way to describe the proceedings is this: Tom Verlaine meets Tom Petty, infused with the lyrical anger of a younger Elvis Costello or Joe Jackson—oh, and there’s plenty of jangly Rickenbackers as well.

If that sounds good to you, read on. The Contrast basically is the name adopted by creative force David Reid, who writes the songs, sings them, plays guitars and often bass as well. Rounding out the Peterborough trio are James Crossley on drums and Chris Corney lending bass and backup vocal support on a majority of the tracks.

Andy Hawkins (Blind Idiot God, Midget) knows a thing or two about powerful pop/rock and ably handles production, engineering and mixing on these 14 songs. While much succeeds here, not everything does—but the large volume of choice more than makes up for it (there’s a healthy 47:40 of music here).

Me, I’m a sucker for both jangly Ricks and musical tales of woe. The jangle really shines most on three superb tracks. “She’s Been Here Before” (the UK single) is an infectious jaunt of a pop song and much to this listener’s delight, sports layers of guitar sounds. “Turn Off the Sun” is yet another guitar-driven pop gem, with a deceptive upbeat sound that runs counter to the antisocial lyrics: “I don’t want to see the sky ‘cause there’s nothing I care about / Nothing that makes me cry / But I’ve got a crazy feeling / I’ve been lying to myself all along”.

“Perfect Disguise” (the CD opener) completes this pop-gem trilogy, and who can find fault with such lines as “You pulled my world apart / You made an art of screwing up everything”. While those three songs might be reason enough to like this album, there’s much more to recommend.

The title song “Mystery #1” is an interesting study in obsessive paranoia within the context of a failed relationship, echoed by powerful guitar lines. “Short Term Memory” is a battle between vocals and guitars to describe another failed love: “There are too many letters in the bags under your eyes”.

“57” is my favorite of the pained failed relationship songs here. More of a ballad, the vocals really convey the anguish of trying to figure things out, the shoulda woulda couldas of what went before and drinking to forget: “It’s been 57 hours since I lost you / Right now I miss you so much my head will explode”.

“Bad Dreams” also manages to capture the existential angst of being stuck without direction, offering the easy excuse of the plaintive cry: “Bad Dreams Come True”.

“You Never Listen” is another catchy one, trading off angry energy with familiar sounds from the past. “Mad Professor” serves up a slower tempo tale of the sad sack professor (e.g. I’m the mad professor of late night bars or of bad ideas) who screws up in spite of his education.

Similarly, the slower pace of “Independance” shows that Reid and company can change the pace and still succeed—there’s plenty of space between the drum beats and the vocals here, and it works well in the context of this oblique examination of the difficulties encountered as an independent band. However “Publicity Stunts” seems to follow a similar formula (perhaps with a little more of a Tom Petty sound)—and as such, takes away from the strength of the previous song (one or the other would have been better served without the other).

Guitars drive the tune “Remember”, which seems very much like some vaguely recalled song from the late 1970s or early 1980s, familiar yet not distinctive. “Falldown” is fueled by energy, but this repetitive song really doesn’t distinguish itself as anything unique. The simple arrangement of the closer “Friend for a Day” is a sweet quiet consolation, telling this friend: “Don’t be sad / We still have Paris”.

Reid shows a lot of promise, mixing many shrewd influences from the past into a wonderful collection of guitar-driven power pop with more hits than misses. This polished performance sounds anything but a debut. He knows his pop, can write a catchy chorus, and has the ability to create guitar hooks that grab you. His lyrics are wry and bleak and often smart and surprising (and yes, words are included in this package that also has some very nice design by Sharon Reid).

Mystery #1 is a good CD made better by the fact that it is one very impressive initial effort. Polish, energy and attitude combine with subtle touches that make it work even after many listens. Hearing it made me eager to know more about The Contrast, and made me want to hear more. As such, the delayed distribution that only brings this music stateside now is a mixed blessing. While this music is new to North America, Europe and Australia, it is two years old. Apparently Rich Mackman of The Vow and Spencer Hart have joined The Contrast and David Reid and company’s new lineup has just finished their follow-up release. A single entitled “Cant’ Stand the Light” from that new CD should be released in the UK this summer and I can’t wait to hear it.

Review: Popmatters.com

Perfect Disguise

Mad Professor

Short Term Memory

She's Been Here Before

You Never Listen

Independance

Mystery #1

Turn Off The Sun

Falldown

Publicity Stunts

Bad Dreams

Remember

Friend For A Day