Another Serene World

Here’s a new band with a lot going against it. First, the name. Kind of clunky. Second, it hails from Ontario, is a cute boy/girl collective, and plays quixotic indie rock with a king’s arsenal of different instruments. These facts align it with labelmates and indie darlings Broken Social Scene and Stars, not to mention the Arcade Fire (there’s even another Napoleon Dynamite–looking member, if you can believe that). The problem is that right now doling out glowing reviews to inexplicably talented Canadian indie-dorks is really out of fashion. What’s most impressive, then, is that the six musicians in TMSR will overcome all of this. Their debut is that good — ambitious, gigantic, and majestic. Each song winds at least a half-dozen turns; there are no choruses, just verse after catchy verse. Should all six members sing here? Yes, they should. Now let’s have Emma sing a song, now Adrian. Let’s stop everything in the middle of this next one, you play some juicy synth chords, we’ll all harmonize together, and I’ll blast out a fluttering piano riff. (Something on a par with the intro to Billy Joel’s “Angry Young Man”? Yes, please.) And jeez, Nick, your fuzzy guitar tone is just too good not to include here. Has anyone seen my sequencer? Oh, and, just because we can, let’s call one song “You’re a Loose Cannon McArthur ... But You Get the Job Done.” Hey Andrew, toss me the keys, I’m gonna go pick up a six-pack and my honorary doctorate from Holy Fucking Shit University, and then after that we’re all getting LASIK.