Something Vicious for Today

        The late 80s/early 90s Idaho troupe the Treepeople are certainly not the type of band I normally listen to, especially on days where I am feeling anything resembling happiness. In fact, most of the time, the entire genre of angry music being played at a quicker than normal pace doesn't really appeal to me in the slightest. It's not that everything is perfect in my existence, but rather that I'm the type of individual who would just assume wallow in a dark cave of mellow sadness when he's upset as opposed to breaking the skulls of small animals. So how does it get to the point where I'm willfully reviewing a double EP album of aggressive, punk infused rock? It's as simple as two sweet, sweet words; Liquid Boy.
        Let's back up a little. Thanks to the internet (and not having to rely on only hard-to-come-by fanzines), we live in an age where one can dig through the back catalogue of their favorite artists. Due to these advancements, we not only have the ability to study their history, but odds are there is a recording of it somewhere, regardless of how obscure. Think about that. It's incredible.  This allows us to map out a family tree style band lineage, backtracking through their career as they make their way to what interested us in the first place. This can be amazing, insightful, embarrassing and or completely understandable. Artists have to feel their way as they grow into the dominant performers that we know them to be later in life. My well chronicled infatuation with Doug Martsch (see: Built to Spill and UOY) led me down this type of a rabbit hole in search of his former groups and guest roles. Armed with an iTunes gift card to help purchase anything I couldn't physically or shadily get my hands on, I dove headfirst into his past. Clicking through the various samples that fine afternoon I stumbled upon something that has driven me as a music fan for the last 20 years; a perfect song.

Doug, are you in there?

        Whether I admit it or not (depends when you talk to me), this never ending search for a crisp, new song to obsess over and possibly become enamored with to the point of creepy infatuation is the real reason I am constantly searching through new music. With millions upon millions of songs out there and me having only heard roughly .06 percent of them, it's easy to become convinced that my next true love is just another click or purchase away from being forever lodged in my cerebral cortex. This is both a blessing and a curse. On the plus side, I've got an amazing new song that will provide hours of repeated listening sessions filled with pleasure and serotonin. On the negative side though, I will now have to start over, almost immediately embarking upon a new search for the next great tune missing from my life. This is a dangerous, cyclical routine that has the potential to leave me disappointed much more often than the alternative. Anytime I think hard about this, it makes me a tiny bit sad. But once the first few bars of "Liquid Boy" pipe through my aural pathways for the 683rd time, it's all worth it.
     When separate (in their original form), these two EPs become the 7 song Something Vicious for Tomorrow and the 6 song Time Whore. Years later (read: when I bought it), these two had been combined into one album with savagely disturbing cover art. Even with that image fresh in my head, all the unpleasant thoughts went away when I heard "Liquid Boy". I have absorbed this song in every possible situation, in every possible mindset and in every possible location. There hasn't been a single time when it was anything other than incredible. When Tommy Iommi thought up the idea of swirling guitar interplay (note: this credit to Tommy may or may not be true) he never could have dreamed that it would lead to such perfection. Mr. Marstch and his bandmate Scott Schmaljohn link minds in a way that must have been inspiration for the neural drifts in Pacific Rim. Guitars dive and dart amongst each other like sea birds gathering a fresh meal. The song weaves it's way through four glorious minutes of this tango, cresting with easily one of my favorite guitar solos of all time. It's reasonable to say that if you and I can't sit down and jam on this song there is a good chance we are going to struggle as friends on any meaningful level (don't ask if I'm kidding about this if you aren't prepared for the truth).
        Thankfully, we are not left with an album that has only one enjoyable song. Though "Liquid Boy" is far and away the standout, there are plenty of other tracks that satisfy your need for rocking out at an acceptable level of thrash. "It's Alright Now Ma" (I'm only Douglas?) delivers on the metal riffs and punk ethos but still manages to sprinkle in enough melody to sour those that like sewing anarchy patches to jean jackets. "Something Vicious For Tomorrow", which oddly enough for an EP is not the first track/single, provides more of the break neck guitar swirls that helped to make these guys something special. It's twice the pace of anything else I would listen to and I have a hard time even trying to hand-drum the beat. The slowed down pre-chorus and mid-song breakdown (filled with vocals that seemingly, sadly inspired Linkin Park) prove that these guys were honing their songwriting chops by the second. From there the EP takes an unexpected turn with the acoustic intro of the Smiths cover "Big Mouth Strikes Again". While not a Smiths fan per se, this interpretation of their work does enough to get me to reconsider my stance on not actively seeking their music out. "Filter" merely does a nice job of reminding me why I prefer when Doug sings, but otherwise is another enjoyable tune. It's filled with what comes to be the trademark sound of this EP; spiraling guitars, a fast paced pounding rhythm section and enough twists and turns to prove that "Liquid Boy" wasn't a happy mistake.
         The first EP closes out with "Ad Campaigns" and "Funnelhead". The former is a track that seems practically sludgy in comparison to the others. Remove the somewhat unfortunate vocal yelps of the verse (and keep the Doug chorus) and it becomes a blueprint for songs that Built to Spill would make exceedingly well for years to come. "Funnelhead" reverts back to the breakneck speed and manages to do so as my second favorite track, bookending this EP with pure gold. While the guitar can be almost classic rock at times, the surging bass/drum help to lead the angst ridden vocals on a path of glorious rebellion. It swerves through multiple layers of intensity before ratcheting things down a few notches for the fantastic outro that showcases everything good about what the Treepeople could be.

Welcome to the club, Tree Person. 

        The crazy thing is, that's only half the collection. The "Time Whore" EP is up next and to be quite honest, it doesn't quite deliver on the same level. That's not to say it doesn't have it's share of enjoyable tunes, but SVFT may have set the bar a little too high. It opens with one of the better examples, "Party". This is the type of tune that is excellent musically and weak lyrically. Normally that doesn't bother me too much, but here it stands out a little more than it needs to. Others, such as "Tongues On Thrones" and "Lives" manage to continue to highlight the brilliant fretwork of the guitar duo. "Radio Man" starts off promising but then gets dangerously close to the kind of angry that I'm less OK with before leveling off at a place where I would again enjoy an instrumental more than anything else. "Size Of A Quarter" borders on being labeled as an instrumental and would have benefited from being one (the odd, news report in the background may have some significance but any spoken words are way too buried in the mix to be decipherable). The title track, "Time Whore" closes out this still solid stockpile as my other favorite track. A bit less hectic with the vocals, the track has more of the ambling feel fans would grow to know and love from Doug in the future. These slower moments combined with the aggressive side makes this a familiar stop on the musical highway.
       All in all, these two short collections are the best work that the Treepeople managed to do in their brief time as a band. While the other albums they created have a few tracks here and there that satisfy my need for brilliant guitar work in symphony with enjoyable melody, too often they're missing those same elements. Honestly though, that's not important to me. This started as a Doug Martsch history lesson and became an unexpected discovery of one of the five best songs ever put on tape (OK, OK, I'm willing to concede I might be underrating it just a little). Finding songs like "Liquid Boy" and packaged EPs like Something Vicious For Tomorrow/Time Whore are one of the reasons that I keep searching for new music. There is always the potential for something amazing that's slipped through the cracks of your world.

Final Score: .95 You're Living All Over Me's for Something Vicious for Tomorrow (+.10 for one song...)

Final Score: .76 You're Living All Over Me's for Time Whore