College Times

Issue date: 3/27/08 Section: Music

Media Credit: Caroline Desilets

Plants and Animals' sound, at its most basic and easily classified level, is similar to that of Broken Social Scene and Arcade Fire, groups that mine classic rock's history for a new cathartic sound. This is a debut that sounds, and therefore feels, familiar with nods to country, soul, gospel and guitar rock.

But, unlike those bands' use of chaos and distortion as a form of instrumentation, Plants and Animals strips away most of the noise, allowing these songs to stand naked.

It's a wise choice; these songs are lengthy and knotty, songs that twist and dissolve into forms unimagined when they began. It's both a chore and a joy to listen as the music unfolds.

Philosophically, the music works like progressive art rock, shifting over the course of anywhere from four minutes to nearly eight, attempting to bring in as many sounds and ideas as possible, while still allowing the song to actually work.

"Faerie Dance" is the first obvious example of this style. It opens with circular-sounding guitar lines, bass guitar and bass drums providing a simple beat, and gospel-style harmonies giving the music a pastoral, modern folk-rock sound.

After two minutes of this, the music fades to nothing before a lone, distorted bass line kicks in a new movement, one that favors pounding drums, guitars, piano, with a bed of eerie strings, reminiscent of many dark post-rock songs. After two more minutes, this movement drops, leaving only the increasingly nervous-sounding strings to bring in a newer, faster final third of the song, one that's more skeletal than what's come before, but seems to wrap everything up perfectly with a loping beat, acoustic guitar and slide guitar melody. It's an epic song, one that never really sounds the same with repeat listens; music like this always has something new to notice, some different moment that stands out.

Not everything here consists of long-form genre exercises and prog-rock suites: "Feedback in the Field" is an upbeat, if not entirely happy-sounding, pop song that's constructed around quick drums and pounding rhythm guitars; "Early in the Morning" is a short folk song that clears the air with its open, atmospheric sound.

Still, it's the songs that do twist and mutate that shows this band's biggest strength lies in their love of pop music, and their ability to play so many forms of it.

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