FAVOURITE SONS

Brooklyn-based Favourite Sons will release their debut album, Down Beside Your Beauty, September 12 on Vice Records. Only together a couple of years now, they already seem to possess the sort of chemistry that some bands take years to develop (and some never do).

Much of this chemistry may be readily explainable, as four of the guys played together previously in the Philadelphia neo-psychedelic outfit Aspera. They have now been joined by former Rollerskate Skinny frontman Ken Griffin, whose voice and pockmarked-heart-on-cirrhotic-sleeve lyrics serve as the group's soul and centerpoint. That voice, actually, is something of a wonder - gliding effortlessly from growly-baritone mode to something more akin to a sad, sweet croon.

Musically, Favourite Sons are just as supple. Almost all of the songs - from one angle or another - tend to take on the sort of '70s sienna tones that in another artist's hands might be described as "honeyed." Here, they often just seem weary. Worn-out. Washed-out. But not dead yet.

Indeed, the band doesn't sound anywhere near dead on songs like "No One Ever Dies Young" and "Hang On, Girl." Here, the riffs and rhythm section rise from whatever deep pit of disappointment and despair the singer previously dug himself into. And, for his part, the singer sounds grateful to have been saved.

Finally, it occurs to me: somebody should have told these guys that there's a natural consequence for producing a debut record this impressive.

You can only go down from here.

Favourite Sons will be playing the following shows in the very near future. I'm guessing they'll be great.

Sep 12 8:00P/Sound Fix In Store/Brooklyn (Williamsburg), NY
Sep 14 12:00P/KEXP's Cheryl Waters' Show/Seattle, WA
Sep 14 8:00P/Chop Suey/Seattle, WA
Sep 16 8:00P/Café Du Nord/San Francisco, CA
Sep 18 8:00P/Spaceland/Los Angeles, CA
Sep 19 8:00P/Safari Sams/Los Angeles, CA
Sep 22 8:00P/Mercury Lounge/New York, NY

[MP3] "Hang On, Girl"

[MP3] "Down Beside Your Beauty"