Western Medication - "Painted World"

As Mulder used to say, "I want to believe". But it's just hard, sometimes. The more contemporary post-punk music we have, the better. Yet, there are a lot of imposters out there who take from post-punk the concepts of danceable tempos and good bass lines but produce music that sounds very trapped in today's shallow indie-rock trends. A good example of this would be Editors: at their best they embody a slight revival of gothic post-punk but at their worst, they're a contrived, over-emotional indie-rock band trying to relive an era before their births. 

Western Medication is more promising and even-keeled than bands like Editors, but this EP has its issues. First of all, why is there an interlude on a five song release? That screams filler, even though filler itself is not always a problem. The perfect example is Black Sabbath's "Paranoid". Penned in a matter of an hour or two, the song went over so beautifully that it fulfilled the need for extra material on the record AND contributed to its success. However, as far as Black Sabbath filler goes, "Interlude" is more like "FX": a clearly superfluous track on Volume 4, that consists of coked up members of the band fooling around with delay effects with no real purpose in mind.

"Big City" is just super-contrived sounding. It sounds like anyone could have recorded it. Really, minus the accents, it sounds like it could have been a Black Lips song. It just doesn't fit that well. And most records include at least one track that doesn't belong as well as the others but on an EP, artists need to be pickier. When it's only five songs, as opposed to ten or twelve, the average quality should be higher. "Big City" makes the whole effort feel a little bit rushed (the same can be said about "Interlude").

Also, in the introduction of "Painted World", (which is my favorite song on here, by far) the kick drum sounds ever-so-slightly off time. It resolves itself during the rest of the song, but in the beginning, it's a bit unnerving.

Overall though, those flaws aside, the EP is indicative of a bright future. Technically, it will take the release of a full LP before anyone can say how promising the band is, but the noisy guitars, back-of-the-mix vocals and thrilling basslines are heartening.  

[Also, post-recording of this EP, they've added a keyboard player. This will only make the future more interesting.]