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Aly and Randy Reviews
Skidmore Fountain Reviews
Powerpopaholic
Power pop music and an honest opinion.
“Cloudless Blue”
Brooklyn’s Skidmore Fountain is a collection of eclectic musicians, Randy Bergida (vocals/guitar), Topu Lyo (cello/vocals), and Steven Cohen (guitar/vocals) who produce alternative pop that has plenty of soundscapes with orchestral touches. If The Flaming Lips and Coldplay teamed up with Jeff Lynne adding a rare flourish, you’d get close to this band’s sound. Opening with a combination of violins and guitars, “Asylum” boasts an impressive array of instrumentation and driving beat to Bergida’s vocal. The highlight early on for me was “Drive By Reflection” where the simple guitar rhythms merge from a Cure-like narrative to a rich orchestral tapestry. The ghostly harmonies, handclaps and guitar breaks of “When The Sun Comes” is a loose series of sketches, rather than a structured song. It’s almost like a pop version of free form jazz. Too often, despite the musicianship, we are missing the hooks here on long winding tracks. Sometimes this doesn’t hurt a song like “Cloudless” or “Whole World” where the melodies and musical textures hold everything together fine. The gorgeous harmonies are upfront on “Sun In The Sky” with a vivid image of beach heat making this my favorite track. Other tracks like “Anyone Around” get too loose, and it almost becomes an extended reggae jam – some listeners will appreciate all the sonic details, but if you’re looking for quick pop songs under three minutes look elsewhere. I have to admit the songs have a soothing quality I don’t find in most pop music.
Cosmos Gaming
Chris Dahlberg
Music: Skidmore Fountain: Cloudless Blue – Our Take
Chamber rock has become a much bigger genres in recent years than some people might have expected. The melding of orchestral arrangements with rock music may not be a new thing, but bands are constantly finding new ways to make it sound fresh. This is true of Brooklyn based Skidmore Fountain, who have chosen to create more of an “indie rock with soaring string arrangements” album rather than going for full on chamber rock/pop. And with their newest release Cloudless Blue the group has proven that they have some interesting ideas that separate them from everyone else.
Although the core of Skidmore Fountain’s sound is based around very traditional sounding indie rock riffs that have modern day and retro influences, they use string instruments as a way to make their compositions stand out from everyone else. If listeners pay close attention, they will likely hear the use of traditional string instruments which help contribute to the melodic atmosphere that many of these songs provide. The instrumentalists never make any of these songs full on chamber rock, and instead choose to go the melodic indie rock route but the way that they subtly incorporate the strings into the mix works incredibly well.
Three of Skidmore Fountain’s members contribute vocals on Cloudless Blue and they often sing simultaneously in order to create some great harmonies. As one might expect from more melodically oriented indie rock, the vocals are fairly laid back and soft in style. What most people are sure to enjoy about this group is the way in which Skidmore Fountain splits up their vocal duties, as it seems as though they never give any one particular member the spotlight and are constantly switching things up. This gives the album a bit more variety than one might expect, and proves to be a good direction for the group to be going in.
Skidmore Fountain seems content to be a fringe band that doesn’t want to conform to either traditional chamber rock or indie rock style, and this does help them to stand out as a fairly unique entity. Cloudless Blue has catchy hooks and very atmospheric arrangements that are enhanced by the various string instruments, and although it wouldn’t hurt them to venture a little further into orchestral territory in the future these guys still have what it takes to win over listeners.
