The Most Serene Republic – …And the Ever Expanding Universe – Album Review

The Most Serene Republic are a septet.  (We’re going to get to the musical significance of that in a minute, but first, think about the difficulty you might have in getting seven people in the same place at once.  Seriously.  If you’re having a dinner party with three couples and a single dude, it takes you like a month to schedule that, right?  I can’t even wrap my brain around what a rehearsal is like for these folks.)  On …And the Ever Expanding Universe, it sounds like there are a lot of people making music; that sounds simplistic (seven people, no shit it sounds like a lot of people making music), but, to a certain degree,  it distills what the record is about.  The sounds on the album are dense and complicated, involving cool shifts in tempo and feel, sweepingly melodic instrumental bits, high and beautiful, nearly choral vocal arrangements and, in short, a bunch of stuff you can’t really do effectively with, say, a trio.  While there’s been a trend this year towards records produced by the secluded and solitary genius, hammering away at the Mac, layering a ton of tracks over top of each other (Say Hi, Telekinesis), the richly organic feel of an enthusiastic group of people making music together is hard to beat.

On the best tracks here, “Don’t Hold Back, Feel a Little Longer,” for instance, the group manipulates this large band dynamic, crafting songs that sound like two or three different things at once.  That track has a pulsing techno drum beat and keyboard riff, but features lilting female vocals countered by a raft of male vocals.  There’s a near round (it’s not “Row, Row, Row Your Boat” by any stretch)  in the middle of the tune that’s a killer mesh of all these sounds catapulting out of the speakers at once.  At the song’s close, everything drops out and a stark piano line is left as the only remaining sound, which segues nicely into the opening piano line on the next track, “No One Likes a Nihilist.”  The song is inherently complex, but doesn’t have the cold, clinical feel you might expect from something with arguably proggy roots.  Often, as listeners, we conflate talent with distance; think, to use an example from an older idiom, of the pose affected by someone like Steely Dan.  Clearly that’s a talented couple of dudes.  Do they seem like you could buy them a beer though?  This is a long way to go to say that the seven folks in The Most Serene Republic are clearly talented (you can’t listen to “Don’t Hold Back, Feel a Little Longer” and argue with that), but manage to maintain an air of humanity that pulses out of the record.  It’s a cool trick.

The elements present in “Don’t Hold Back, Feel a Little Longer” pop up all over the record.  The vocal round is used to great effect in “Catharsis Boo,” the near techno drum sound is a prominent feature of “Phi,” and the delicate piano lines are underneath many of the brasher bits on several songs.  (”Phi,” by the way, has a bad-ass vocal breakdown that’s tough to describe succinctly; I’m pretty sure I could get it done in 300 words or so, but the video below will save us both a bit of time.)  Overall, the record’s about sweeping, dramatic sounds, however, and the band uses a variety of methods to get to them.  The vocals throughout are top-notch, often perking up the ears with their complexity or delicacy.  Overall, there’s a lot to like here and the dueling consistency and variety reward multiple listens.

…And the Ever Expanding Universe is out on Arts & Crafts on July 14.  If “Heavens to Purgatory” and “Phi” catch your fancy, it’s worth picking up.  (”Heavens to Purgatory” is one of the more straightforward tracks on the record, devoid of some of the pleasant bells and whistles that adorn a lot of the other tracks.  “Phi” is probably a bit more representative of the album as a whole.)  If you’ve got a bee in your bonnet to hear the whole record now, you can sign up for the band’s fan club (cleverly titled “Army of the Republic,” which made me chuckle) and stream the entire album right now.  Good times.

“Heavens to Purgatory” – The Most Serene Republic

Snag The Most Serene Republic at insound.

As promised, here’s the video of a live performance of “Phi.”  The vocal bit that’s particularly intriguing is around the 2:30 mark.  To bring this whole thing full circle, look at all of the people on stage.  Jesus.  The keyboard player is essentially in the front row.  If these folks add a supplementary percussionist or something, they’re going to have to put stadium seating on stage.