When I do the show listings each week, I like to hunt around for information and music by some of the bands so that I can say something about them when telling you about the show. Back in April, Asbury Park Yacht Club featured a show by a band that I mis-typed as "Small Talk." I remember having trouble finding anything about the band, even coming across bands with similar names that obviously weren't them. Well, it turns out that Smalltalk is the latest project from Zak Kaplan (The Ratchets), Pete Steinkopf (The Bouncing Souls), Jamie Goldfarb (Miss TK and The Revenge), John Chladniček (Zero Zero), and Tara Jones (The Get Rights); that April 11th show was their first live performance; and I'm a terrible journalist.
That show also saw the official release of the band's self-titled, three-song EP. Given the backgrounds of the principals -- punk, synth pop, garage rock -- the sound of Smalltalk is a bit of a surprise. Each of the three tracks takes me back to a time when I was driving my sand-filled, silver Tercel with the FM106.3 sticker on the back up and down the Jersey Shore.
"Fountain of You" opens the set; and, right away, Steinkopf recalls poppy proto-shoegazers like The Jesus and Mary Chain or Cocteau Twins. Kaplan's vocals swirl around acoustic and electric riffs over the course of the song's six minutes. The song's noisy finale and a hint of darkness in the bassline reveal some of the aggressiveness in the members' DNA. The same can be said for the chorus of "Kill Me Fast," a song that starts out with some atmospheric U2-like guitar before it breaks into a mini frenzy as Kaplan asks, "Can you kill me fast??" Chladniček's bass drives the post-punk "Go Love" embellished with some ethereal backing vocals from Tara Jones and heavily distorted guitar.
The timing of this one is great. Summer on the Jersey Shore always makes me think of working the pavilion at Sea Girt and the music that I played on the radio all day while flipping burgers. This has lots of that, but it also lets some of Smalltalk's modern personalities shine through.
Smalltalk is available to stream / purchase over at Smalltalk's Bandcamp page. If, like me, you missed the band when they had their coming out party, you've got another chance to catch them on June 20th when they play the Court Tavern with Dollys, Pour the Pirate Sherry, NGHTCRWLRS, and Morningside Lane.
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