Oh No! Oh My!
Oh No! Oh My!
[self-released; 2006]
The DIY ethic's nothing new, as any caveman will tell you, but in the indie universe it still matters, especially for bands relying on throngs of internet hype and scenesters' word of mouth. Like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Nashville-based Oh No! Oh My!'s debut is self-released and registers across the indie spectrum and beyond, drawing comparisons from the Shins to Simon and Garfunkel. However, Nashville ain't no Brooklyn, and certainly no one's spotting David Byrne or David Bowie at their gigs. Throw in the band's Google-phobic moniker, and you've got yourself a hype machine running solely on a MySpace page and scattered blog fumes.
Songwriting duo Greg Barkley and Daniel Hoxmeler pull off the half-serious, half-goofball indie shtick just about as well as you'd expect from two proud home-schoolers. Obviously the guys have girl troubles, though they're just as likely to deal with them earnestly ("Goodbye to my sweetheart/ You fill my day up like a spark") as they are in tongue-in-cheek, Violent Femmes fashion ("Jane Is Fat", "Women Are Born in Love"). This pull-no-punches, anything goes strategy creates a more relaxed, effortless feel than so many starchy indie up-and-comers vexed by the desire to immaculately emulate their favorite influences. Using twee as a jumping off point, the band utilizes an orchestra's worth of instruments that takes their sound through alt-country, electro-pop, and back.
Opener "Skip the Foreplay" is a "Sesame Street"-flavored flourish, despite lyrics about sex and pregnancy. Barkley sweetly coos the story of an overeager lothario who impregnates a girl before bursting into an über-cute chorus of "doo-doos" and "nahs" over sparkling synthesizer lines. "Walk in the Park" could become your favorite summer folk jam. Bouncing ebulliently from chord to chord, the band hedges the song's wide-eyed gush and family-friendly snapshots with a melancholy sound that quickly evaporates into the sing-song chorus.
Unfortunately, too many tracks simply dote on impish melodies and moony aesthetics. Songs like "Lisa Make Love! (It's Okay!)" and "Women Are Born in Love" simply run out of steam where more confident tracks "Jane is Fat" and "I Have No Sister" motor through hooks and stylistic twists. Luckily nothing's too egregious here, and the album drops at a propitious time considering the bubbly images it conjures of ice cream trucks, beach balls, and slackers having awkward sex. Although exhibiting rather unassuming technical chops, the band's unique charisma should garner results in your heart's blog search engine, if not Technorati's.
Posted to Pitchfork by Adam Moerder on June 01, 2006.