Skelliconnection (Dig)

Chad VanGaalen | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 22, 2006)
• Original Release Date: 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Sub Pop
• ASIN: B000G1TOU0
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #54,846 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Sing Me To Sleep

2. Flower Gardens

3. Graveyard

4. Systematic Heart

5. Mini Tv's

6. Gubbish

7. Rolling Thunder

8. Dead Ends

9. Red Hot Drops

10. Wind Driving Dogs

11. Dandruff

12. See Thru Skin

13. Burn To Ash

14. Viking Rainbows

15. Wing Finger

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

With the follow-up to last year's Infiniheart, Chad VanGaalen makes it clear he's fascinated by inventing hybrid words for his album titles. These are apt monikers, as they mirror his methodology as a songwriter and recording artist. Perhaps even more varied than its predecessor, Skelliconnection fearlessly marries pop smarts to a mad inventor's cabinet of tricks and surprises. Other than a series of visiting drummers, VanGaalen has again created these songs himself. The results can pummel, invite, hypnotize, cheer, or sadden--sometimes all within moments of each other. From the opening onslaught of "Flower Gardens" to the front porch strumming of "Wing Finger" and the melancholy lullaby of "Sing Me 2 Sleep," this disc has everything you'd normally find on a half-dozen different releases! And it all flows like a perfect stroll down a path in the woods. --David Greenberger

Product Description

Using an assortment of instruments, both conventional and handmade, Chad's created an even more diverse assemblage of music than for his last album and debut, "Infiniheart". He's an amazingly talented illustrator and animator. You may have seen his videos for his own "Clinically Dead" and Love As Laughter's "Dirty Lives". Both were featured on MTV2's "Subterranean" video show, which Chad also hosted. He's played with Built To Spill, Wolf Parade, and The Pixies, to name a few. This record is a restless, living thing, roaming between simple yet beautiful ballads, aggressively dissonant post-punk and jazz-inflected synth-pop explorations, at times whimsical, and at others heartrending.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, Even Brilliant Indie Pop, October 10, 2006

By 

221b BakerSt (USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Skelliconnection (Dig) (Audio CD)

VanGaalen is a Calgary based illustrator/animator/musician who recorded the 15 songs that make up "Skelliconnection" in his basement studio at home. This is by no means a lo-fi recording, though. Instead, it's a beautifully produced, stylistically diverse album that sounds like a collaboration between Devendra Banhart, Beck and the Moldy Peaches. Standout tracks include the rocker "Flower Garden," "Red Hot Drops," "See-Thru-Skin," "Dead Ends," and the lullaby-like "Sing Me 2 Sleep." This has to be one of the best indie releases this year, and one of the best albums of the year, period.

5.0 out of 5 stars Inscrutable, Kaleidescopic Indie Pop, June 27, 2011

By 

A Blues In Drag (NYC) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Skelliconnection (Dig) (Audio CD)

One of the most inscrutable artists I've heard in a long while, this Canadian one-man band exploits indie electronica, creepy folk and barn-burning rock and ends up with something utterly unique.

I heard "Flower Gardens," this album's opening cut, on Sirius' Left of Center and immediately went online to order a copy. It's a barn-burning romp powered by pounding tom-toms and fuzzy, down-picked eighth notes on the bass. But there's nothing else on Skelliconnection that bears any resemblance to this song whatsoever.

Chad Van Gaalen is something of a musical chameleon, a highly imaginative and apparently wildly prolific one-man band who veers all over the place, stylistically, going wherever whimsy takes him. Luckily, he succeeds at most of what he attempts; whether it's metallic bluster ("Flower Gardens"), creepy folk ("Rolling Thunder") indie electronica ("Red Hot Drops"), Appalachian blues ("Wind Driving Dogs") or any number of other musical subgenres that pop up over the course of the album's 15 tracks. Van Gaalen's soaring falsetto occasionally recalls Thom Yorke or Neil Young. The lyrics are usually bizarre (conjuring pterodactyls, headless corpses, photosynthesis and graveyards) and the music jumps all over the place, but it never sounds like he's trying to get your attention.

By the time you reach the end of Skelliconnection, it's hard to believe you're still listening to the same album that started with "Flower Gardens."

0 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exactly what I expected, August 31, 2007

By 

L. Nava - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Skelliconnection (Dig) (Audio CD)

Saw the artist in Canada and recommend alternative rock/EMO listeners to check this CD out.