Bedroom Rehab Corporation, Fortunate Some: Everything Looks Like Nails
Posted in Reviews on December 3rd, 2015 by JJ Koczan
First time I saw Connecticut duo Bedroom Rehab Corporation was Summer 2014. That doesn’t seem like that long ago, but it was far enough removed from 2013, when the New London bass/drum outfit released their debut full-length, Red over Red (review here), that I knew their next release was going to be one to watch for. Fortunate Some is a four-song EP, and on every level it is a step forward from the preceding release. In terms of the performances throughout of bassist/vocalist/pedal-board-wrangler Adam Wujtewicz and drummer and other noisemaker Meghan Killimade, most definitely.
I won’t discount the value of that album, because I enjoyed it plenty at the time and those songs continue to hold up live, but in the last two years Bedroom Rehab Corporation have clearly gained a firmer grasp on their sound, on the kind of band they want to be, on the atmospheres they want to convey and on the force with which they want to convey them. The fact that they returned to producer Justin Pizzoferrato, who also helmed Red over Red, and tracked at the same studio — Sonelab, in Easthampton, Massachusetts — only further conveys the progression they’ve made sound-wise. And in terms of presentation, Fortunate Some arrives as a pro-pressed 180g 12″ vinyl in gorgeous purple and gray swirl to match the Liz Walshak (Sea, ex-Rozamov) artwork’s weighted vibe. I like a CD as much as the next guy — probably more — but the uptick in professionalism all around is noteworthy, and since it comes coupled with the best songwriting Bedroom Rehab Corporation have yet proffered, it’s all the more welcome.
Aggression is a central factor in the band’s approach. Wujtewicz is a comfortable shouter, and slides easily into a post-Melvins gruffness that was raw the last time out, but is smartly mixed from the get-go here on opener “Riddles of Wind and Time,” pushed further back in the chorus of an already deep-running mix so that the bass tone around it sounds even larger. Couple that with an increased confidence in cleaner singing for the verses and “Riddles of Wind and Time” is barely past the minute-mark before it has effectively showcased some major elements of Bedroom Rehab Corporation‘s advancement. Killimade‘s drumming holds a tension efficiently via hi-hat in the verse and opens into crashing choruses, her snare punctuating the flood of fuzz as it cuts through, and the two move seamlessly into a fluid bridge before returning to the verse and riding the groove outward. Their propensity for roll was something Red over Red established well, but in keeping with the theme, they’ve upped their game there too. The catchiest hook of the four songs, “When all You’ve Got is a Hammer” opens likewise fuzzy and sets into an almost immediate nod.
Structurally, it’s not all that different from the opener, with a quiet verse over a spacious foundation contrasted by a more intense, shouting chorus, but the difference is in the impression left by Wujtewicz‘s delivery of the lines, “When all you’ve got is a hammer/It becomes all you need/All I’ve got is this hammer/Everything looks like nails to me.” That chorus becomes a prevailing impression for Fortunate Some, ending side A with a fullness, thickness and meanness that builds on what the debut accomplished without casting the prior release entirely away. At over seven minutes, there’s room to explore, and the second half features a wash of noise that takes the spot a guitar solo might otherwise occupy, but here as well, Killimade and Wujtewicz skillfully make their way back into the chorus to finish.
Side B is immediately more ambient and/or noisy, but “Giants in the Ice” is ultimately more about a buzzing, rolling groove than experimental underpinnings, and it has that well in hand. Departing the back and forth of the first two tracks, “Giants in the Ice” is more linear in its energy, more consistent, but it does shift in its midsection to a quiet moment before surging ahead with more richly-toned fuzz, and Wujtewicz saves some especially vicious shouts for the end. That leaves only “The Serpent the Smiler” on the short release, and it’s the longest (8:28) and most ambitious inclusion on Fortunate Some, very much led by Killimade‘s tom work, which emerges over a bed of subdued noise and feedback only to be joined by the bassline shortly in a kind of not-quite-post-metal push (and better for that “not-quite”) of a verse that comes topped with cleaner vocals as the start of a build that will take Bedroom Rehab Corporation through the remainder of the runtime, that sense of atmosphere never lost on the patient, engaging but still near-manic thrust.
The release comes with a notification that, “There are no guitars or keyboards on this album!” and “The Serpent the Smiler” could easily be why, as the bass is pumped through whatever effect might make it sound like an organ in the chorus before a shift after six minutes to feedback introduces the progression on which Wujtewicz and Killimade will march out, a kind of instrumental hook, faster and almost low-end squibbly but infectious all the same. It is matched to a verse, Killimade swapping out cymbals all the while, and in kind with “Giants in the Ice,” it finishes intense, this time in pacing as well as vocals. The symmetry of the EP I suppose is another aspect one could look at as evidence of how far Bedroom Rehab Corporation have come in two years (they started in 2008, restarted in 2011, but still, thinking of the time since the debut’s release), but if anything, it’s a symptom of the larger refinement of focus on display across the board with Fortunate Some, which seems to build even as it tears down.
Bedroom Rehab Corporation, Fortunate Some (2015)
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