Whatever you're doing, you have time to do more. That's the message I get from Sink Tapes. The most prolific band in New Jersey crank out song after song, EP after EP, LP after LP while I sit here drinking coffee wondering what I'm going to do for lunch.
Window Unit Blues, by my count of titles on Bandcamp, is Sink Tapes' fifth full-length album since 2012 and second this year. Throw in a couple of EPs, some singles and demo comps; and you've got a band that write and record music at an amazing clip. And it's not one of those "let's throw everything against the wall and see what sticks" kind of things. Sink Tapes and principal songwriter Gabe Chiarello hit the mark with a regularity that's mind-blowing. Window Unit Blues shows the band spreading their wings a little bit and even moving beyond the 1,2, or 3-minute pop song in a couple of instances to produce their most diverse and, possibly, best album to date.
The album opens with "Window Unit" and the sounds of sitting by an open window as traffic rolls past. Those sounds are followed by acoustic guitar and some distant and wispy vocals from Chiarello. The song fades, and we move into the indie pop of "You Shouldn't Have." The song contains hints of the twang and jangle of R.E.M., but the vocals place it somewhere dreamier and more ethereal.
"Haskell Heavy Hitters" moves into the realm of jangly, retro pop as it goes out on the repeated call and response of "You're an honorary member... ...of the Haskell Heavy Hitters." "Spacecraft Theatrical" sways on a vaguely country vibe, and both songs owe a great deal to that Guided By Voices thing of building a coherent and infectious pop song around a strange or nonsensical phrase.
By the time "Indicating Laughter" and "Few Things" roll around, I start to think the the sequencing is important here. We move from a pair of jangly tracks into a pair that rely a bit more heavily on distorted chords and walls of noise. "Few Things" gets positively psychedelic or shoegazy as it motors along on a krautrocky beat embellished by some reverb-heavy guitar leads.
I've often lamented the fact that Sink Tapes' songs can be so short. "Wanting One Blues," at about seven minutes, is -- following another quick Bandcamp search -- I think the second longest song in the entire Sink Tapes catalog and the longest in about five years. The vocals are buried deep beneath the guitars, including a solo that kicks in at about the two minute mark and gets more frantic and prominent as the song moves along. It's a bluesy, classic rock (Pink Floyd?)-inspired song in which it's pretty easy to get lost.
Single "Plastic Lover" gets a re-worked version here, less acoustic with a bigger, more up-front guitar solo. Another hallmark of Sink Tapes' MO is that songs appear to be living things, never finished, always ripe for a re-working.
The title track closes out Window Unit Blues and brings things full-circle. It's a fleshed out rocked out reprise of the album-opener and -- sequencing again -- sums up the band's evolution over the course of the record from gentle jangle pop to something a little noisier where lead guitar takes a bigger role. As the song fades out, we're back to the same outdoor noises streaming into our window unit.
I've said before that Sink Tapes are one of my favorite bands right now. They pump out material with a consistency that's hard to comprehend. As evidenced on Window Unit Blues, consistency doesn't mean "sameness." Sink Tapes are a band that try new things, even with old songs, and make them work. They deserve a following and a fanbase that extends way beyond the Garden State, and I think they'll get it.
Window Unit Blues is out now on Sniffling Indie Kids and Mint 400 Records.
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