Telekinesis! - Telekinesis!

Although I was moved by the cover art (due to my zest in simple killer designs), I overlooked the eponymous debut from Telekinesis! simply by the sheer tag of “a Death Cab rip-off junk band” and it became even more hazy when I figured it’s an indie bedroom record by one man i.e. Michael Benjamin Lerner. Now where the hell did I become so prejudged and occupied with these kinds of music that do you no good but filling up your disk space with memory unit allocations that you may never fetch out or intend to try for a second time? The truth lays under two good excuses:

• One: The record is produced, mixed and engineered by Death Cab For Cutie’s guitarist Chris Walla and flashbacking to his solo in 2008 named Field Manual may mean that he’s sly enough to help DCFC songs sound vital but not charming enough to be the sole man behind the mic.
• Two: Owl City! This is what happens when you accurately imitate The Postal Service. Man, I don’t think I can ever get back to that album. Make it stop! Make it go away!
  

Few months passed by and while browsing FluxBlog one day, I saw “Tokyo” mentioned on the blog and Matthew Perpetua calling it “a good song from an album I’ve recently given a so-so review on Pitchfork … that needs a close attention”. Well, judging by the fact that P4K usually and intentionally exaggerates some unbearable clamors and then underrates and ignores a huge deal of good albums, I gradually found myself getting the album and thankfully I don’t regret it.

Primarily, Telekinesis! is NOT a Death Cab wanna-be act and through the darkest of lenses, Michael Benjamin Lerner is very well inspired by the band and that’s all! Namely, the record is not another indie pop bedroom rocker to throw away anytime soon. It might be true that all 11 songs are mediocre (rather cool mediocre in fact) and therefore are not considered as hits but at the same time this consistent presence of mediocrity leaning upwards makes the album far from boring. And unlike its similar contemporaries, from the jump start of “Rust” till the ending moments of “I Saw Lightning”, the fun is spread out all over the timeline with a wise tracklisting of high, mid and low tempo pop songs.

Telekinesis! is one of those records that may not get you instantly but definitely won’t leave you this soon either. It’s quite a hardship familiarizing yourself with a new indie band these days that doesn’t particularly play anything eccentric or weird. And if there’s mediocrity and there’s the absence of math-rock, so be it. Sometimes, too much complication drives people crazy! It has happened to God-sents all through history and you don't wanna join that club.

The Seattle resident Michael Benjamin Lerner is the think tank behind the project and Telekinesis! is pretty much his band, but when it comes to playing live, he teams up with Chris Staples, David Broecker, and Jonie Broecker. They are signed with Merge Records and I think I’ll stick to them for a while to come.

* If you need an MP3 check our previous post out!
* Buy Telekinesis!
* Telekinesis! on MySpace