Monday, July 30, 2007

The CINCH (Canada)

THE CINCH EP
-CD
2002 (Stutter)





"After honing their craft in the darkest recesses of Vancouver's rock clubs for a couple of years now, The Cinch have finally given us their debut release on Stutter Records. A short, sharp, 5 song (one unlisted bonus track for all you modern lovers out there) dynamo that reminds one of early Dream Syndicate and Wire. Glorious, driving rock 'n roll, delivered by nervous, buzzsaw guitars, a tough-as-nails rhythm section, and fronted by a coupla' edgy female Richard Hell's. A summer must-have!" - Zulu


"Ever since the popularity of garage-pop bands such as The Strokes and The Hives made buzzing, twisting guitar riffs and primitive, Meg White-approved drum chops en vogue, cutesy bands that wrap grunge rock around vintage pop chords and feature some self-important sap behind the microphone have inundated hipster record stores and coffee shops across North America and beyond. Armed with little more than some vintage threads and their Velvet Underground boxed set, most of these groups should never have existed in the first place, probably, except maybe in order to fill that all-important first slot on the $5, five-band bill at the local Cavalry Chapel.

Fortunately, when The Cinch crawled out of the primordial ooze of some rehearsal space in Vancouver, it didn’t give a hot damn about being cute or taking itself too seriously." - Casey Lombardo


"The Cinch were able to win people over so easily that you might almost call their whole career a string a splendid flukes. Shortly after the band started writing songs and performing, they played a couple of gigs at a battle of the bands contest hosted by the UBC radio station. Despite taking on a new member just before playing their first contest gig, the Cinch won—and scored some studio time as a result. The result was their first EP, released in 2002, and represents the first time the Cinch had ever set foot in a studio." - Angels Twenty



"As the Strokes were taking New York by storm with their blend of lifts from late-era Velvet Underground, early Modern Lovers, and the first Television album, Vancouver's the Cinch were perfecting their own distaff blend of the same influences. The difference is that the Cinch's debut lacks the whiff of arrogance that colors the glammy New Yorkers' efforts; the far more diffident vocals of Jennifer Smyth are Doug Yule or Richard Lloyd to Julian Casablancas' Iggy Pop/David Johansen cross-breed. More importantly, the five-piece band (also including singer/guitarist Kathy Dube, guitarist Mark Epp, bassist Geoff Thompson, and drummer C.C. Rose) burns through these three-minute pop songs with punky intensity instead of snotty attitude, giving lesser songs like "French Maid" and "Got To" an extra energy boost even as it lifts top-drawer stuff like the kinetic opener "Once a Week" and the howling "Talk and Talk" to a higher plane. In these surroundings, the closing cover of the Modern Lovers' classic "She Cracked" not only stands up to the original, it almost sounds like an original. The Cinch was originally released on the tiny Canadian indie Stutter Records in the summer of 2002. Seattle's slightly larger Dirtnap label gave it a belated United States release in early 2003." - Stewart Mason


Kathy Dubé
(guitar, vocals)
Mark Epp (guitar, vocals)
CC Rose (drums)
Jennifer Smyth (vocals, percussion, guitar)
Geoff Thompson (bass)


Tracklist:
1. Once A Week
2. Got To
3. Talk & Talk
4. French Maid
5. She Cracked

Download (192 Kbs, 19 Mb)

9 comments:

Aladasian The Meerkat said...

Woof! This is nice and crunchy! That and the prev'y posted GrimSkunk and Pluto albums are sweet as well! Keep on upping the cool tunage!

P.S.: Have you managed to come across a copy of the Bloody Chicletts album yet?

Dgrador said...

Thanks, you're making me blush.
I wasn't aware of the Bloody Chicletts until this moment. Maybe there's one at my local record store.

Aladasian The Meerkat said...

Awww, i made you blush? It's okay, hehe. ^_^'

I've been looking for some of the hard to find CanCon stuff (so hard to find in fact, i don't think the albums exist in digital format unless you REALLY scour the internet's bowels - and even then, good luck). I lucked out and managed to snag things like the Transistor Sound & Lighting Co.'s album from a couple of peeps, The Wonderful World of TPOH from a soulseek user and other things online in MP3 Format, as well as have a couple of rare things myself in my own cd collection (if you are looking for something that i might have).

Aside from TBC's "Indtroducing...", i'm also on the hunt for Salvador Dream's "UR", a song called "Weirded Out" by a band whose name i can't remember, a clean vinyl rip of the "Strikes" LP by Thundermug (the ones i've found so far still have some surface noise on them)... just to name a few.

This blog is one of the few (MP3 Maniaco, MoodSwings, RegnYouth, Gustavoeo, RockRula, etc.) that i follow in my search for tunes or albums that would pique my interest, actually - so you share the credit on some of my digital acquisitions. :*)~

And as i mentioned before, keep up the good work and keep on finding some of this nifty stuff.

Dgrador said...

There's a sizable pile of "nifty stuff" about 4 feet away from me, still waiting to get ripped as soon as I find the time. I've been burning the late-night candles recording some new tracks with my band, who are also playing at FuzzFest NorthWest in Oregon in a few weeks.

Thundermug hail from my hometown, and my first road band shared management with them in their later days after Joe left.

"Thundermug Strikes" is posted at a few places.

Time Traveller has this link active:
http://sharebee.com/9f122e5a

And "Orbit" currently lives at Robots For Ronnie
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=97KVQR5Z

Aladasian The Meerkat said...

Sadly, that vinyl-rip of "Strikes" might be the same one that's been making the rounds the last while which i've run into a few times already that has some surface noise and other anomalies on it, too...

Hmmm, curiosity is gonna kill this kat, but is there anything of your band that might be up somewhere for listening to or streaming?

Dgrador said...

My current band The Fiends has 2 posts here.
My 80's band The Finks has a 7-inch online at:
http://chrwradio.com/lma/1987/The%20Finks%20-%20Now/finks.htm

Sadly, whatever recordings were made by my 70's band Storm vanished over 20 years ago...

Aladasian The Meerkat said...

The 7" and In Scareo are nice... the latter sounds like the bastard child of Cat Butt and (i think) The Evaporators in a way.

Both are pretty fun listens though! :*)~

Anonymous said...

I loved this. Especially "She cracked" was excellent. For some reason, I've really started to like female vocals like this, so do post more of this kind of stuff.

Dgrador said...

Lotsa girlbands on the way in the next while... in the meantime you can check the archives.