Sold Out!

PT11 – Mako Sica – Noise Attic Session 2

Limited to 100
Format C55 (midnight blue tape)

The mood was rather melancholy.  A friend and I were sitting at the bar on a surprisingly deserted evening at the Empty Bottle.  Granted it was a Tuesday night and I suppose the bands were a bit esoteric for the typical hipster crowd of the celebrated Chicago venue, but Scott Tuma was making a very rare appearance.  And for all fans of Midwest experimental rock, that is not a show to miss.  Even myself — a notorious homebody who just hours before ended a relationship for one noble reason or another with probably the most attractive young lady he’d ever have the privilege of dating — made it a point to be at that show.  And it was a good thing I did.

After downing that first beer with an unwarranted vengeance, I noticed the opening act taking the stage.  “Mako Sica,” the handbill said.  Never heard of them, don’t care.  I went back to the bitching and nitpicking that I snuck in between gulps of Three Floyds as they suited up.  Then something happened.  A few warmly plucked guitar strings slowly evolved into wave after wave of reverberating melodies that drifted, overlapped and eventually coalesced amongst sporadic outbursts of impressive technical drumming and tumultuous noise.  My attention was immediately captured, which was immediately followed by its complete submission.  There was singing, but no lyrics, no narrative.  The bass line would gallop one second and lay down a destructive ripple of low end the next.  A trumpet doing its best Lester Bowie impression would swivel and swirl just on the softer side of cacophony despite the wall of sound the feedback insisted upon.  It gained immense pressure without ever letting the gasket blow.  In fact, it was exactly what this poor sap of a man needed.  Mako Sica filled the Bottle and its six patrons with enough musical empathy that evening to make even the brokest of hearts sigh in relief.

As a rule, we here at the bustling offices of Plustapes don’t question the opportunities that fall in our laps (for example: see directly above).  And we certainly couldn’t pass up helping this talented band find a wider audience.  It’s not shoegaze.  It’s not dream-pop.  It’s not krautrock, post-punk or experimental psychedelia.  But it does encompass all of their characteristics; and in the process, it soothes the aching soul.  The mood was melancholy that early September evening.  Mako Sica embraced it, and made a handful of thankful fans in the process.

www.myspace.com/makosica

Available (or soon to be) at these fine establishments: Reckless Records, Aquarius Records, Permanent Records

This entry was posted on Monday, March 2nd, 2009 at 4:40 pm and is filed under New Releases. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.