Band of the Week: Tapes n Tapes

Sure. To a lot of people it might seem pretty late in the game to add my voice to the throng of folks heaping praise onto Minneapolis' Tapes N Tapes, but I had several friends from San Francisco visit me recently who'd never heard them, so I thought it was still worth talking them up a bit more.

I'll say it very plainly and inelegantly: If you haven't picked up their album The Loon, you should go do so right now.

It's one of the cds I've found myself coming back to most often this year. Some tracks on it are showers, others growers. Several songs like Insistor, Omaha, and Cowbell are immediately likeable, but ones like The Illiad and Jakov's Suite will likely come to nudge out the others as your favorites later on. And the songs on The Loon sound different enough from one another that it almost feels like you're listening to a mix cd sometimes.

I mean, take an album like Wolf Parade's Apologies to the Queen Mary and it's fantastic, but many of the tracks have a similar feel to them, so if you overplay one, you'll probably need to take a break on the whole shebang for awhile.

But with The Loon, there's enough variety that it holds up much longer. Some are reminiscent of The Pixies, the aforementioned Wolf Parade, and Broken Social Scene -- which is basically rarified air since you're talking about both one of the greatest indie rock bands ever and two acts responsible for some of the best albums of the last few years -- and others like no one else you can think of.

Originally a self-release, The Loon has been picked up by XL Records and should be easy to find both locally or online. So stop being so monocle-twirlingly contrary about "hyped bands" and snag it, so you have time to properly appreciate it before the band tours through here again in a few months.

Tapes N Tapes are playing on Friday, June 16 at The Echo with local heroes Cold War Kids. Tickets are $12, doors open at 8:30, and The Echo is found in the Echo Park neighborhood of LA at 1822 Sunset Blvd.