Set aside 21 minutes. Make a mug of hot tea. Put a blanket over your shoulders. Get comfy on the sofa. Now you’re ready to hear puppyy’s debut album, World Record.
With all songs coming in at less than 2 minutes and 45 seconds, Michael Gibbon and his co-conspirators from Down Under deliver arrangements well beyond the diminutive length of this 9-song album. Although most songs are driven by the acoustic guitar and straightforward drums, they’ve certainly packed in plenty of well-placed instrumentation to guarantee bang for your buck.
Burner, World Record’s second track and for my money the best one on the album, highlights puppyy’s strengths. Imogen Cygler’s swirling, scratching and crescdenoing violin in the intro bookended with a perfectly located lightly crunchy fuzzed-out guitar for about 15 seconds leading toward the end, and a cloud of organ in the middle, all demonstrate puppyy’s subtle superpower: the knack for picking the right sound at the right time without overdoing it nor laying down unnecessary overdubs to fill the space.
Lyrically, through Gibbon’s reflections on relationship issues, World Record unveils a split personality. On one hand, we encounter gratifying image-inducing word play and phrases (e.g., “Waiting on the sidelines / with a bottle full of red wine / all the bitter liquids burnt his insides / just like acetone,” from Gutterball). On the other hand, puppyy relies on somewhat cliché and uninspired output (e.g., “She said, ‘Don’t be scared / I promise I’ll be your guide / like a guardian angel / I’ll be right by your side / like a guiding light / I’ll help you shoot for the moon.’” from Follow; or “Don’t be sad / we’ve all got things to lose / one door closes / another opens soon.” from Boxer). While there is certainly potential for Oberst-like lyrical brilliance, World Record’swords and stories – and the emotions they are expressing – are generally overshadowed by the engaging instrumentation.
Speaking of which, the instrumental number, Range, is an unexpected and delightful surprise midway through the album. Time to get off that sofa and into your car for a windows-open-driving-down-the-highway tune. Of course, at 2 seconds short of 2 minutes, you won’t get very far, even breaking the speed limit. But, I’d put it on repeat for a few extra km. When the bass kicks in at 12 seconds, you just can’t help but smile. The melodic guitars have a voice-like quality, singing without lyrics. Hoping for more of this on puppyy’s next release! And I sure hope they extend Range to a hypnotic 10 minutes live and take their audience on a cheerful journey.
It takes confidence to put an instrumental on your debut album, and puppyy does it twice! Respect! A second instrumental, Prairie, could be imagined as an interlude on an Elliott Smith record. Just a tad more downbeat than Range, Prairie delivers pitchshifted keyboard, simple but eloquent piano and violin, and a rhythmic acoustic guitar that takes on the role of the percussion section; and well-named, as this would be perfect with a beer on a wooden porch under a veranda looking over a prairie.
Overall, via World Record, puppyy aims at a certain melancholy that’s reminiscent of the early 2000s, back when melancholy arguably jumped to the top of indie music lore. The conciseness of these songs is refreshing and works for this debut, and I’m looking forward to what they produce next. However, on a follow-up LP, puppyy and their listeners would stand to gain from more in-depth, developed songs, especially with more lyrical creativity and less reliance on common expressions.
Listen to World Record on Spotify or on Bandcamp, where digital, CD, and cassette are available along with a Boxer/Gutterball A/B side 7-inch vinyl – all very reasonably priced in AUD. However, to really get pulled into puppyy’s world, this reviewer, for one, would have loved to have seen the lyrics and some liner notes uploaded on their Bandcamp page.
Written by Greg Gobel
