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Underground > Radio & Music >

The Liars - They Were Wrong So We Drowned

17:18 / 26.02.04

I thought that this band had been discussed here before, but a search yeilded nothing, so here it goes.
I saw these guys at their CD release party in Williamsburg two nights ago and man did they ever rock. Sure, secret guests the Yeah Yeahs Yeahs played for longer and were perhaps a little tighter and more crowd-pleasing, but the Liars played an extremely ballsy, out-there and weirdly dynamic set.
Angus Andrews has got to be one of the most magnetic and theatrical punk/freako front men in the business. There seems to be quite a backlash against the new album, but for my money the new material isn't really that much different from the old stuff. Sure you can't dance to it as much and there's a lot of talk about blood and the devil, but it still makes me want to jump around and it doesn't sound like anything else I've heard.
Who else has heard the new album? Do you think it will catch on? Will their popularity wane until they release the "Japanese pop" record they've hinted at having in the works, or will occult(ish) electronic noise punk become the new "in" sound?

Matthew Fluxington

18:14 / 26.02.04

Aside from "There's Always Room On The Broom" the new album is pretty terrible, lazy, and drab. It deserves every bad review it is getting. Trust me, it's not going to catch on beyond the Pitchfork crowd.

If this album doesn't sound like anything you've ever heard, I'd point you in the direction of Ege Bamyasi-era Can, and Brian Turner's show on WFMU, which plays a lot of similar music that is often much better than what's on the new Liars record. To my ears, They Were Wrong So They Drowned just sounds like half-assed pseudo avant by a bunch of guys who are totally phoning in their performances.

If they really make a "Japanese pop" album (which I imagine is just a joke because they probably think it's funny to say that they are going to make a J-pop record because they are such obvious indie snobs/rockists), then good for them. It'd be nice to see them do something a little less obvious.

20:39 / 26.02.04

Yeah, I wasn't so hot on it at first, but it really started to grow on me. You sound like you really hate it though.

I like how it sort of channels a lot of avant-garde sounds into a form (theoretically) more palatable to the masses. I guess what I meant by saying they don't sound like anything else I've heard is not exactly that they are an entirely new beast, but rather are presenting some old ideas in a manner that seems new to me. I didn't really catch the Can connection but I've only really heard Future Days - isn't their whole Teutonic funk thing really more apparent on the first album anyway?

I took the J-pop comment to be a joke too, but what if it were true?

Matthew Fluxington

20:44 / 26.02.04

Can were pretty eclectic, every album was pretty different. A lot of their music isn't very funky at all. I don't think Liars first few records sounded much like Can, though.

21:52 / 26.02.04

I haven't yet got hold of the new Liars record, but I already know I love it.

The very concept is so exquisite it makes me weep;
Much-hyped trendsetting New York post-punk group decide to follow up successful debut with hideous electro-noise concept album about witches.

It's such a fantastic statement of intent and a strike back against hipster media hype - as far as I'm concerned, the more ghastly and fucked up it sounds the better!

Actually, I've loved the Liars ever since I went to see them play, expecting some dodgy overhyped garage rock, and gasped with joy as they took the stage and immediately launched into a wall of gloriously anti-social Big Black-esque racket, causing the audience of Strokes lookalikes to collectively stumble backwards about three feet..

And "There's Always Room on the Broom" is my favourite title/slogan of the years, hands down.

God bless them. I love them to bits.

Bring on the scary noise and the witches.

Matthew Fluxington

22:00 / 26.02.04

I don't think it's really a reaction against hipsters at all. If anything, They Were Wrong So We Drowned is the ultimate macho misanthropic hipster move - "we're abandoning our rock music, now we're gonna go avant noise and alienate everyone." If you actually know a lot of Brooklyn hipsters, it's a pretty obvious move.

03:55 / 27.02.04

This record rocks. They set out to make a freaky record and they did. Have had the mp3's since the begining of January, can't wait to go up to Cleveland to pick up the record Saturday. Gatefold. Whooo hooo. Probably pick up the single with the Einsterzunde Neubauten ape cover. Super fun.

Sound like Ege Bamyasi era Can? Listening to it right now. Don't really see it. But, whatever.

So Matthew Fluxington, are you a Williamsburg Hipster? Guy I work with created this game, you might want to check it out, might have seen it before actually. Hipster Bingo! Cringe if you are on there! Laugh if you aren't!

Matthew Fluxington

10:55 / 27.02.04

I've never lived in Williamsburg, and I've never really fit in with those people. I just know a LOT of them because I went to art school in NYC.

lord nuneaton savage

11:05 / 27.02.04

(threadrot) Theres a similar game for the Electro/fashion student crowd. To wit "Hoop earrings...Ra ra skirt...Stripy tights...Sunvisor BUCKAROO!!!

18:00 / 21.03.04

Saw Liars on Thursday in Cleveland, was completelly blown away. Took some pics, have them in a slide show. Wish I could sum it up better, but I think Adam Warlock did a great job. My friend Krayon likened it to seeing Psychic Tv in '89 at the Phantasy Theater. Like you were part of something really big, dark and freaky. Rock and Roll black mass.
I would suggest to anyone that listened to the record once and didn't like it to go check the show out anyways.

15:16 / 22.03.04

I just got hold of the album today.. (£4.50 off ebay, cheapskate that I by necessity am)..

Loving it so far - 'Broken Witch' is amazing! Definitely my anthem for today..

I can see where Flux is coming from with the Ege Bamyasi/Tago Mago era Can comparison, but I feel it's probably more coincidence than plagiarism, in that not many people have chosen to explore these particular musical avenues. I don't think they're ripping off Can any more than Straightforward Rock Band A is ripping off Straightforward Rock Band B, but whilst they're floating through the weird no man's land outside of genre templates it's natural they should provoke comparison with others who've done the same. If you see what I'm getting at.

More than anything, I think it sounds like vocals and bass from the previous Liars album (there's more stylistic continuation than I'd expected), but with the other instruments re-recorded by some mental druidic mushroom fiends who revere Suicide and Can.. and c'mon people, how good does that sound?

No? Just me then? well ok.

Anyway, it's just as spooky and crazed as I'd hoped.. bravo.

Oh yeah, and I too can vouch for the intensity of the Liars live experience. Before I saw them play I kind of had them written off as boring, sneering hipsters, but they played with such energy and such a love of noise and chaos that by the time they'd finished, my view had changed to "MESSIAHS!". For weeks afterward, I really hated their first album.. their live sound was so incredible I thought they'd shot themselves in the foot by releasing a deliberately crappy-sounding, half-arsed album (although obviously it's charms grew on me as I played it more).

I can't wait to see them bashing their way through their new songs and aesthetic, and I echo what Number Nun said - if you kind of like the idea of what they do, but aren't entirely convinced by the records - GO SEE 'EM LIVE! It completely changed the way I thought about the band, turned me from a sceptic to an instant fan.

The Return Of Rothkoid

04:17 / 08.04.04

I have to say, I was pretty unimpressed with this one.

Then again, I fucking hated their last one...

12:09 / 08.04.04

Well it's certainly split Barbelith opinion.

I like it more every time I listen to it, which is frequently.

It kind of has a similar twisted atmosphere and sense of deliberate musical perversity to Sonic Youth's 'Bad Moon Rising', I think.. both, oddly, second albums by arty New York bands recorded out in the countryside.

13:43 / 09.04.04

Just read they are playing re-tg. Wish I was going.

19:24 / 17.05.04

new liars video here

A

04:50 / 18.05.04

I've been listening to this album a lot since it came out, and I've really been digging it. It's certainly a "grower", rather than a record that instantly grabs you, but I really don't understand all the talk of it being "unlistenable". It doesn't even sound particularly scary to me.

I don't think that "There's Always Room on the Broom" or "They Don't Want Your Corn- They Want Your Kids" would have been out of place on the last album, and while most of the rest of the album is a long way from pop music, it still seems to have been made to be lastened to, not just as some tedious avant-garde experiment.

It is kind of a shame that there's no longer a group that sounds like Big Black playing disco, but I can always just put the first album on for that.

Matthew- you seem to be displaying levels of cynicism about Liar's motivations that are bordering on Borecore. It's your posts on this thread that almost sound like a Pitchfork review. I see no evidence here that Liars are trying to earn cred points from an elitist/indie/hipster crowd, I think they've just made the record they wanted to and, in doing so, established themsleves as a band that can do whatever the hell it wants, rather than the leading lights of credible disco punk, or something.

And they kicked arse live, too.