Other Lives: Tamer Animals - Album Review

Other Lives
Tamer Animals
Rating: Grrrr

Channeling Ennio Morricone through a Radiohead filter, Oklahoma five-piece Other Lives creates futuristic dust bowl Americana, whose epic sweep is surprisingly intimate and emotional. Utilizing mostly traditional instrumentation, with the members shuffling between guitars, percussion, horns, and strings, Other Lives' sophomore album Tamer Animals is immediately familiar but also sounding not exactly of its time and place. Gone is the overly fussy production of their debut album, and in its stead, a more strategic focus. Not that Other Lives have gone minimal by any stretch of the imagination, the songs are stuffed with lush instrumentation and haunting harmonies.

Tracks like "For 12" marry galloping acoustic guitars with mourning strings straight out of Radiohead's "How To Disappear Completely." Leader Jesse Tabish's voice haunting and strange, singing of the search and quest for what could be family or the meaning of life, traveling so long that "... it feels like forever,
When your mind turns to fiction."



There is a cinematic feel to the tracks on the album, with lots of nice builds and sweeping drama. "Dust Bowl III" evokes its title well; you can almost see a barren landscape with dust and tumbleweeds blowing past.



The minor moments are also quite sublime. "Weather" is an atmospheric track with a particularly affecting vocal from Tabish. His voice aching with longing and resignation. The music moving from traditional sounds into a mid-song break filled with buzzing, ominous keyboards, segueing to a gorgeous bridge of ghostly harmonies.



Tamer Animals is best though when it ratchets up the sweep and drama. "As I Lay My Head Down" slides along a vaguely Spanish/flamenco beat, with haunting voices and strings rising and falling through the mix.



Title track "Tamer Animals" borrows from the majestic hurricane of artists like Florence + The Machine, all aching, lop-sided piano rolls, and booming percussion.



The album is not perfect; there are moments that don't seem to gel as perfectly as they should. "Old Statutes" suffers from a fussy arrangement, and is one of the few tracks where the harmonies come across dated. Closing instrumental "Heading East" feels out of place in the flow of the record, and would perhaps have better utilized as an intro or a bridge between the two halves of the record. "Desert," while suitably dreamy and cinematic, never seems to transcend its merely pleasant production.

Tamer Animals is a record that will haunt you for days. Snippets of melodies come rushing through my head, leaving a ache for more. There is a boldness to this record; the band knowing when to raise the drama, or settle back into mood and atmosphere.

Rating Scale:

Chilfos: masterpiece; coolest thing I've heard in ages.

Woof Daddy: excellent; just a hair away from being a masterpiece.

Grrrr: very good; will definitely be considered for my top releases of the year.

Yeah Daddy Make Me Want It: good; definitely invites further listens and peaks one's interest for more material.

Meh: not horrible, but certainly not great; could have either been polished, trimmed, or re-thought.

Jeez Lady: what the hell happened? Just plain bad. They should hang their heads in shame and be forced to listen to Lady Gaga ad nauseam as penance.

Tragicistani: so bad, armed villagers with pitchforks and torches should run the artist out of the country for inflicting this abomination on the human race.