Customer Reviews

Two Guns, Twin Arrows

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

My reaction to this album could be a result of the musical desert I was in at the time I first heard it, but it's my favorite ablum of 2002. Alex Dunham gets screaming again on a couple of tracks - takes me back to the days of Hoover and Regulator Watts. He's got an odd sense of timing on the vocals that adds to the atmosphere and the sense of urgency in his growling voice. This works great on track seven, over top of guitar feedback making it sound like everything's about to fall apart. The addition of June of 44's Fred Erskine on trumpet is excellent, esp. on track 2. Two guns, twin arrows has a good balance of angular, dissonant rock and the quieter melodies more familiar to their S/t.

Also, the drummer is excellent.

alex owns; past and present.
if you liked the regulator watts, you'd like this.
thats all you need to know about it.

...but still pretty good nonetheless. When this record first came out, i actually thought it was better than the self-titled one, due to there being a more "Hoover/Regulator Watts" feel to it. There is more distortion and screaming on this one as opposed to the sullen tone of the previous record, and it's definitely more upbeat. When i saw them live, they had Fred on trumpet, and it was awesome...so i was a little bummed when i bought the self-titled cd and he was nowhere to be found on it. So needless to say i was ecstatic when Two Guns, Twin Arrows came out, since it would represent the band i saw live better...But flash forward a few years, and the first record has only gotten better to my ears, while this one has become slightly less. I always find myself reaching for the other as opposed to this anymore, although there are some great tracks on this album. And that trumpet that i so desperately wanted so long ago, is now a bit of an annoyance on some tracks...go figure.

I was quite impressed by the first album by Abilene, so when I heard there was a folowup album, I was very exited. I searched high and low for info and song samples on this album, and it seemed to slip under everyone's radar on the internet 'cause I couldn't find anything. I ended up buying the CD and now I know why! It's a rather mundane, tiresome effort, apparently stuck in time (like around the "heyday of Crownhate Ruin" timeframe). Fred Erskine's somber trumpet is only a sad punctuation mark on the tiresome sprawl of this album. Dust off your old June of '44 debut album if you're in any way tempted to get this one.