Posted by Jack in 2010 | 0 Comments
The Entire Happy Birthday Album
Sub Pop is so confident that you will buy Happy Birthday’s self-titled debut album, that they are allowing us to stream the entire album on Seizure Chicken for free.
Originally conceived as a back-up band for the lead singer Kyle Thomas, Happy Birthday has been creating uncomfortably addicting pop tunes in the Southern Vermont obscurity of Brattleboro since 2008. Their ascent to the top of the shit hill of indie music is even more impressive and rapid when you consider that these guys only had to play one show outside of their hometown before they were signed to Sub Pop and opening for fellow musical lunatic Devandra Banhart.
So obviously there is a lot of hype and an air of expectancy surrounding HB’s debut album, and for the most part it delivers the catchy lunacy that tracks such as “Subliminal Message,” and “Girls FM,” have promised. Happy Birthday is an airy mix of 60′s radio, borrowed melodies, and enough reverberation to drown a bathtub. Kyle Thomas’ songs are self-aware trips through a heart broken by pop culture backed by sometimes crisp, sometimes gravelly guitar work, and a host of effected harmonies. The simultaneously gritty and ethereal opener, “Girls FM” is a perfect example of the kind of strange and forlorn pop music that you can expect on Happy Birthday’s promising debut album.
