Customer Reviews

Different Damage

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Dancepunk is the new superbuzz-word in the indie community these days, not without good reason, and this often overlooked album is what I think is the genre's defining moment. Sure it doesn't offer the dancy synths of the Rapture or the ultra-abandon of !!!. What it does offer is the perfect mixture of dancy drums, manic vocals, and punk rock attitude that I can't find anywhere else. So while this album may not be dancepunk by convention, they offer elements of both dance and punk into one oh so tasty package. This is just as technically proficent as Pretty Girls Make Graves, as unpredicable as Fugazi and as fun as Hot Hot Heat. The lyrics always offer up their fair share of surprises. The music is so catchy and original. If this really is the sound of DC than I'm so happy I go to school down here.

q and not u raise the bar with this one. i loved their first album, no kill no beep beep, and found the second-hand griping about similarities to other DC bands pretty unfounded.

but those gripes should be erased after a listen to different damage. i guess if anything this album lays off the angular two-guitar interplay and emphasizes the bounce in the beats. the songs are all memorable, and definitely unique. personally, i haven't heard a record like this before. and i like it.

It's debatable whether the loss of their bass player inspired Q & Not U to revamp their sound. After all, Mathieu Bourlique apparently left the band over the direction the band was taking. Strangley enough, he might be one of the few cases of a musician leaving as his band becomes more experimental and uncompromising. Indeed, Different Damage is where Q & Not U becomes Q & Not U, so to speak.
No Kill No Beep Beep was an excellent exercise in spazzy post-hardcore in the vein of At The Drive-In and Les Savy Fav, only perhaps more fractured. There was not a hook to be found, and the time changes set Q & Not U apart from a lot of other post-hardcore bands with the so-called "Dischord" sound. On Different Damage, however, Q & Not U moves beyond their debut LP by adding in more texture, melody, and experimentation to their sound. On Different Damage, there are less hooks, less crescendos, and a potent mix of funk, jazz, indie-pop, and post-hardcore that defies any easy label. You can hear bits of Gang Of Four, Fugazi, and ESG in their sound, and the onslaught of tunes works best as a cohesive whole.
It can be argued that Different Damage is perhaps too fractured and that the band didn't develop the songs as much as they could. This may be the case, but Different Damage is a strong artistic statement either way. "Soft Pyramids" is like nothing on No Kill No Beep Beep, while "So Many Animal Calls" and "Recreation Myth" are perhaps the most immediately accessible. It's "This Are Flashes," however, that is the strongest track, a blistering bit of dancey post-punk that works excellently.
A previous reviewer referred to Q & Not U as dance punk, but Q & Not U is beyond any genre. Let Different Damage speak for itself. It's the sound of a band realizing it's potential and becoming an artistic force to be reckoned with.

I was not that experienced in the ways of Q and Not U when I saw them about a month ago. I saw them with a bunch of faceless but generally decent Indie-rock bands at the one and only Chicago pit, The Fireside. After three mediocre bands were finished with their sets, I was curious as to what to expect from these DC area boys. The handful of songs I had heard were good but could not even begin to reveal the specticle of Q and Not U. After a jaw-dropping live show(complete with percussive dust pan, jingle bells, keyboard noise collage and melodica), I bought the album from the guitarist from the band and proceeded to listen to it. To date, it is one of the catchiest, smartest, albums I've heard in along time.

Though fairly serious in message and lyrics, their musical presentation is generally both playful and experimental. To some degree, its like Red Medicine but still filled with enough personal flare to stop the Fugazi comparisons dead in their tracks. As for the music itself, it ranges from noise attacks, to gentle but energetic indie pop and abrasive punk, sometimes all in the same song. The stronger tracks are spread out and given regular length songs while the more experimental or punkier songs are shorter but still potent. The musicianship is dead on and tight as a drum. The songs are propelled by a strong sense of dynamics from guitars, bass, drums and vocals that never miss a beat. The strength of the band relies on making sure your not sure will happen next. Even some of the more straighforward tracks have unconventional hooks that just make the recording that much stronger. And clocking in at a solid 36 minutes in length, it never seems like the CD is either too long or too short. Its a welcome break from the monotony of not only mainstream rock but the blandness of alot indie rockers that receive more praise then they really should. Q and Not U on the other hand deserve it by the bucketful for creating a masterpiece such as this.

When I bought this cd I was not a big Q and not U fan...
"No kill no beep beep" thrilled me enough to try this album, but anyway I wasn't prepared to what it would happen when I put it on the stereo.

What was that? a damn good song... Soft Pyramids, a great kick-off song (not like that A line in the sand crap), an enjoyable moment of great music, and pretty cool lyrics (I love the way they sing spelling the words and creating this almost bizarre rhythm)...

the other song I really LOVE is Air Conditions... it sounds like a little post-rock anthem, with an evanescent (and beautiful) melody and a great sound... "C'mon where are you.."

Snow Patterns makes the triad, another great moment of this album, which I consider to be the best one in Q and not U's short (for now) discography

but also in this album there are some fillers which ruin the work, giving a lack of cohesion to the album itself...

I don't like very much the faster songs...

2 1/2

Unimpressive set of spastic art-punk exudes a suggestive jagged edge when in reality shows little musical knowledge to back any of this posing up. Q are your typical self-conscious Indie-type band who frustratingly attack their instruments and compositions before even realizing a direction in which to seek, and the best I can say about Different Damages is that it might make you bob your head in certain spots with it's immature but enticing rhythmic convictions. As annoying as much of it can be, at least they attempt to bait listeners every which way in their limited eclecticism's, and for younger experimental hipsters some of it will definitely work.

This cd, has it's ups and downs. I wasn't very pleased with it at first, but it has grown on me. It's a little faster paced than Power and No Kill No Beep Beep, but it has become another favorite of mine.

q and not u is a fresh sound in the music scene today. they have an energy and produce melodies that will stick in your head for days. skeptics will compare them to fugazi and i say yes, ian mackaye produced the record but this isn't a fugazi clone. some of the songs are angular enough to make LIARS fans happy and some are catchy enough to make Bright Eyes fans happy. they sound very dc and very dischord.
After their AMAZING bassist left i thought they would be terrible and they actually improved all the loose ends in the previous record "no kill beep beep" . "Soft Pyramids" is focused using the previous records jagged dc hardcore guitars adding samples and keyboards into the sound. The whole thing feels dancy yet rock and roll at the same time.
perfect to play on your rainy april days.

Another review states that this album isn't very different from "No Kill No Beep Beep". I contend that it's an entirely new approach from the same band. Q and Not U has evolved to a usually softer sound, less emo-core than before. While the first album was incredible, this album is a pleasant evolution of the older sound, with less distortion, less speed, and a lot more melody. The sound now includes aspects of ska, bossanova, reggae and all sorts that have been melded into an even more unique Q sound. Musicianship is just as high as before, but now you can dance to it. Enjoy.

This trio has come out of the Washington D.C. area to claim the throne left by The Dismemberment Plan's (D-Plan) impending breakup. They're not, however, merely filling D-Plan's shoes by mimicking their every move. Q And Not U (QANU) has developed a sound that is all their own, but still not wary of sounding similar to their predecessors.
The album kicks off with "Soft Pyramids" which lets the band show off their spelling abilities, by spelling off the first line or so of the song. They continue to flex their spelling chops sporadically throughout the song. This track is carried on an oh so solid rhythm section headed by the drum work of John Davis.
The second track "So Many Animals" and the sixth "This are Flashes" are both prime examples of the influence that D-Plan has had on them. Both tracks as well as a couple others show trademarks of D-Plan's spazzed-out grooves, circa Is Terrified. QANU also inspire thoughts of Spoon's most recent release, Kill the Moonlight. Songs like "Air Conditioning" and "Meet Me In The Pocket" both have Spoons signature swagger engraved in them.
While, yes, they do inspire obvious comparisons, they have also developed a sound all their own, and they show it off often. QANU show off their experimental side on the two shortest songs of the album "Everybody Ruins" (1:51) has a long primal, percussive, and yet spacey build up (taking up a minute of the song) that leads to a very abrupt ending. So once it sets in that there will be no more D-Plan albums and you're done crying and over you're mourning you can pull yourself out of your haze and walk down to the record store and get the new D.C. kings' latest opus.