Albums by this artist

Ether Teeth (2003)

Fog

Ether Teeth

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» CALEY COOK | CONTRIBUTOR

Fog Ether Teeth Ninja Tune, 2003 RiYL: Yankee-era Wilco without choruses, Radiohead in hell, driving in dangerous nighttime fog

If necessity or progress had anything to do with music, this album would have long been hailed as the worst disc to ever shoot forth. It has no sound that is either necessary or progressive to any end. This is Fog, a.k.a. Minnesotan Andrew Broder, and his multi-instrumental talents have become an oddball exercise in combining noise with un-melody and beats with instrumentation. Broder is not necessarily accessible doing either one, but he gets a gold star for effort.

Invading Thom Yorke territory (emotive message told through the keystrokes of a madman), is nevertheless an awkward exercise for Broder and he stumbles through most moments on Ether Teeth. It’s rather painful, actually, as the patience required to sit through his doddlings grows short after the first sounds of "Plum Dumb."

Going from kindergarten xylophone on “What a Day Day” to sneeringly teary on "See It? See It?" Broder crafts a lurching underwhelm of sounds. “The Girl from the Gum Commercial” actually succeeds in some noisy favor towards its end, alternating from low-key quiet to ballsy abandonment, but breaks its own momentum too much in the end. Singular parts of this disc throw forth a few pretty piano chords or guitar strums but don’t expect to gain anything from this listening.

CALEY COOK |