Palomar II

Palomar

Product Details

• Audio CD (April 23, 2002)
• Original Release Date: April 23, 2002
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Self-Starter Records
• ASIN: B000063Y1Q
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #332,096 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wake up call, September 1, 2003

By	D. J. Kaminsky "photothatdodo" (Brooklyn, NY United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

If you order a martini at the Bowery Ballroom you should be careful of getting burned. The vodka in mine was at least part napalm.

And I still regret taking such a big gulp of the stuff right before Palomar started playing Trade Off because I definitely forgot to swallow, making the burns worse and sending my esophagus straight to hell.

(As an aside, I hope I'm never accused of calling anyone "700 times a day.")

I'd never seen Palomar before, never heard one of their songs, but even over the fuzzy speakers in the basement bar where I was waiting for Rainier Maria to play, the power Palomar has deep down in all those damn catchy guitar hooks was able to convince me to abandon the burning martini and move my feet toward the stage.

There I came face-to-face with what looked to be an all-female (apologies to the drummer who I couldn't see) four-piece synched together with fearsome split-second precision and some songs that bit and chewed in ways that I'm still trying to get my brain around.

Most of the bite seemed to emanate from the lead singer who might be the only lyricist/musician since Johnny Rotten to blaze with the type of chainsaw ambition that her lyrics were full-of. Johnny Rotten's ambition was white hot and Rachel Palomar's ambition is white cold. Either way you're still gonna get burned.

Outwardly Palomar's sound is a little like what you'd expect if the Beach Boys and the GoGo's got together with Kim Deal and Black Francis to cover a bunch of Alvin and the Chipmunks songs. But that description doesn't do Palomar any justice.

Because trying to understand the war that is popular music in America is all about trying to figure out where the music wants to take you. Britney wants you in a seedy strip club full of ATMs. Wilco wants you at a county fair where they serve vegetarian corndogs. Palomar puts you in overdrive, headed for a place that doesn't exist yet where every bar is full of friends, every friendship is full of honesty and honesty just might be a ticket to heaven.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is good and fun, and so fun its good, April 9, 2004

By A Customer

Listen to a couple of the samples and you will not be disapointed. Fun rock, somewhere between Sleater-Kinney, The Breeders, and the GoGoS. Its been in my rotation for quite some time now.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars cute factor, May 20, 2003

By	Jameson Rachen (Austin, TX United States) - See all my reviews

i remember the first time i heard palomar. their drummer, matt, gave me a 4-song demo tape. it took me a while to actually listen to it. my hopes weren't very high. i can't say i loved the whole tape (though "washington" will always be a favorite palomar song of mine) and i can't say that the vocals weren't difficult to get used to, but that's all changed..."II" is masterfully recorded to really show off palomar's vocal skills, especially in the beautiful, beautiful harmonies. it all makes me think of scooby doo for some strange reason, and the chipmunks (in the hyper-activeness of it all), but in a good way. this is all a tremendous improvement from the self-titled first full-length (which still isn't bad at all), but the sad thing is, its going to be hard to top this record palomar. did i mention the cuteness factor? its hard not to fall in love with them...