Here’s an abstract sentence I didn’t think I would ever hear:
“If you gave The Postal Service a banjo they would become Freelance Whales.”
Formed as recently as late 2008 in Queens New York, Freelance Whales honed their “precariously arranged pop songs” busking in the streets and subways of the Big Apple. The band thrive under a gestalt idea of each simple instrument and sound combining to create a much more impressive, layered, interwoven body, like a synth-folk landscape painting combing simple individual forms into something beautiful and resonant as opposed to the usual cacophony of battling electrics, pedals and solo guitars each fighting the other for limelight. The peaceful idea of each member and instrument happy with its own easing simplicity and the combination of that simplicity into something greater and more moving is something that comes across strongly in this band.
Something that cannot be avoided (by my ears anyway) however is their similarity to The Postal Service, especially the vocal style, which sounds so like Ben Gibbard it seems feasible that he is simply working under a pseudonym or has single-handedly perfected cloning in order to give himself more time with wife Zooey Deschanel, which would be an understandable move. Some tracks such as Generator^2ndFloor depart from The Postal Service sound in favour of a more choral gospel feel and this may be the direction the band will take if they are to avoid hack writers spending more time describing the life of Ben Gibbard and co. than themselves.
With such a short history but a doubtlessly promising future little else remains to be said about Freelance Whales for the moment. If you like The Postal Service (and who doesn’t?) but are also a fan of slightly more folky, organic styles such as Animal Collective, you will like this band, they aren’t breaking boundaries but they are adding good material to under-populated ones. Their debut album Weathervanes was released on ITunes last August and actual physical CD’s (remember those?) were released on cdbaby.com in October. Freelance Whales are touring the U.S. until January.
IOHO recommends the tracks Generator^2ndFloor , Broken Horse and Starring
Broken Horse
Websites
http://www.myspace.com/freelancewhales
Tags: acoustic, animal, banjo, ben, ben gibbard, broken, cab, choral, collective, cutie, death, deschanel, folk, for, freelance, freelance whales, Generator^2ndFloor, gibbard, horse, indie, new york, organic, postal, queens, service, starring, stevens, sufjan, synth, wethervanes, whales, zooey
