Artist: Fair to Midland
Title: Arrows and Anchors
Type: Album
Label: Season of Mist

My immediate and very insular reaction on seeing the band name Fair to Midland was that they must be from Derby or Wolverhampton or somewhere like that. Well, they’re not. In fact they’re from an agricultural town in Texas, USA, and have been around since 1998 performing “Alternative Rock”. This wasn’t the only surprise. The claim from the band is that this album might be “the heaviest non-metal album you’ll hear this year”. Support for this statement comes within a minute of the start, as “Whiskey and Ritalin” bursts into an explosion of guitar superimposed onto a bouncy and enjoyable pop track. The harmonies are great, the song is catchy. It’s like the Monkees have reformed and gone Metal. But this is just one angle on an album which is unusual thanks to its mixture of musical genres.

Pop, Rock, Metal, Prog and on “Amarillo Sleeps on my Pillow”, a bit of country music – these are ingredients which are used and mixed together to make a very colourful dish. Each track has its own personality. Common to all of them are strong song structures and engaging harmonies. The lyrics are intriguing and combine the unusual with a nice common touch: “I’m not the sharpest tool in the shed”, “we never like to get our feet wet” and so on. The wacky “Rikki Tikki Tavi” and “Whiskey and Ritalin” are odes to metal. Yet mostly the structures are pop-based, heading towards Progressive as we enter the developing, richly segmented and 10 minute complete experience of “The Greener Grass”. What I heard at different times over the course of this album was Paul Simon, later Beatles, Mike Nesmith, a multitude of “serious” pop bands and Katatonia. Now I’ve no idea whether Fair to Midland have ever heard of Katatonia but “A Loophole in Limbo” and to a degree “Bright Bulbs and Sharp Tools”, one of my favourite tracks on the album, have the same feel. There’s a continuity about “A Loophole in Limbo”, which errs on the heavy and atmospheric side. The harmonies and lyrical technical remind me like Renske weaving his dark web. “Bright Bulbs and Sharp Tools” is more upbeat, like Katatonia blending with George Michael. There’s a quirkiness about all of these songs but above all they’re well structured and imaginative. Tracks like the awesomely majestic “Greener Grass” have melancholic moments but most are tracks to sing along to, tracks to enjoy and make you smile. “Short Haired Tornado” is one such groove-laden song. The vocals are soft, the tune is memorable and catchy but the keyboards and drum pattern add sophistication. The track ends with a piece of Post Metal. By contrast, the following song, the pop-structured and bouncy “Coppertank Island” is dominated by a catchy synthesiser rhythm. It’s impossible to know what to expect. This is an album where I found I just had to go with the flow. Fair to Midland make that very easy.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, we are in a little bit of a predicament”, is the announcement to start “Coppertank Island”. Well, so was I when I first heard “Arrows and Anchors”. I didn’t know what had hit me. Musical and creative imagination comes from all sides in all sorts of shapes and forms. There aren’t enough words to describe the variety. I know I’ve only captured some of it in the above description. Different styles are used as individual tools towards a distinctive and amazingly kaleidoscopic end. I cannot tire of hearing this intelligent album. Each song has been individually and carefully prepared. Its appeal no doubt comes from the fact that that it’s fresh, catchy, audience-friendly and has wonderful harmonies, but there’s so much for any music lover to enjoy here. “Arrows and Anchors” is a magical album.

http://www.ftmband.com

www.myspace.com/fairtomidland

Andrew Doherty

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