Cassette Review // Fir Cone Children "Fog Surrounds Us" (Blackjack Illuminist Records)

€7 //
Edition of 15 //
https://blackjackilluministrecords.bandcamp.com/album/fog-surrounds-us //

Fir Cone Children are back and this time their cassette starts fast and it cuts like a knife.   There is a little sampling of "Last Christmas" in here and it is just so noisy yet melodic at the same time.    This takes us into a song which is fast paced but yet still feels like something out of those new wave era like Modern English meets The Weakerthans.   This continues with another poppy punk song that falls somewhere between Schatzi and The Secret Handshake (which was a CT band that had a CD with only a few songs on it but I really should get to finding out how to bringing that back to life one day)

The keys in this make me want to get up and dance.   While there can be elements of other bands such as Digger, this really is in a genre all of its own now and after all this time you would only hope that was true with Fir Cone Children.    This one really hits hard and fast to the point where if you think something along the lines of twee is boring then you haven't been listening to these songs.

As the title of the third song suggests "Making Friends Is Easy", but I don't find that to be true so I like to sing along with it in an ironic way.   The drum machines bring in a feeling of Neon Trees now and if you're not moving to this one I'm not sure you're paying attention.   "Into The Sea" does have a fun beach way about it which makes me think of Coastal Car, who are also making music on cassette in the modern world.

The flip side starts off rambling and reminds me of some combination of Dynamite Hack and the softer side of Filter.   This brings out that more fun twee sound which is borderline surf and just makes you want to get up and dance but, you know, in that fun way kids danced before the drugs really took over the music scene.   This turns into "Sleepy Mouth", which is heavy on the distortion but has a melody which makes me think of The Monkees, possibly because I could also imagine this as being a song within an old episode of Scooby-Doo.

Louder.  Softer.  Faster.  Slower.  The static comes in through these songs.   It's noise plus melody and as you get to the end of what could be somewhere between Superdrag and Supergrass, it's difficult to put Fir Cone Children into a list of comparisons but if you are a fan of upbeat music or noise rock then I think you will enjoy this one.  Perhaps its true beauty is in that way that it can cross those two different paths and find potential listeners on both sides.