Suggested Listening: Nurses

Portland’s Nurses are what I’d like to call pop rock mavericks (not the Palin kind though).  Why?  Well their debut LP Apple’s Acre has all the makings of a great pop record – innovative lyrics, melody, and of course the hooks and catchiness.  But instead of putting these songs together with the standard instruments and ideas, they traverse every road, genre, mood, world, night, day, life, and death to arrive at their new form of stunning pop rock.

Take the opening track of Apple’s Acre, “Technicolor”.  It’s a folkish pop song primarily hinged on a hypnotic melodic chorus yet it’s even more compelling because of the audio arrangement – a faint piano, booming tribal percussion, and bells.  I feel like I’m in the middle of Aaron Chapman and John Bowers’ (the main members of Nurses) attic in Portland when these sounds hit my ears.  Prompting me to say, “Where’s my tambourine?”

That same rhythm progression leads right into the next song “Mile After Mile” only this time a parade of voice overdubs/stretches and odd synths emphatically flurry around the main vocals – a much more intense affair.  This is how the rest of the album flows – swelling with a barrage blares and blasts some moments…pacifying to a slow rolling calm wave of melody the next moment.  All the while a sense of well crafted pop music is flowing through each tracks veins.  I hear similarities to Empire Of The Sun and MGMT, but only certain aspects.  There are no dance floor intentions with Nurses.  This band, now a trio (James Mitchell has joined them as a percussionist and visual artist), tends to lean towards the rustic dance around the yard folk pop tribal explosion of a sound.  Apple’s Acre is out on August 4th via Dead Oceans.

mp3: Nurses – Technicolor

mp3: Nurses – Caterpillar Playground

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