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Twin Town High (vol. 8) |
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The Jim Yoshii Pile-Up: Awkward Name, Awkward Sound
Wednesday 09 October @ 10:02:30 |
 by Rob van Alstyne
Despite a housing shortage that would make the Twin Cities current situation look idyllic, San Francisco has continually managed to churn out great bands. The Jim Yoshii Pile-Up, a five piece band heavy on guitar splendor and emotive vocals, appear to be next in line for the highly coveted “great Bay area band” title based on the strength of their sophomore stunner Homemade Drugs. Or they would have anyway, if lead singer Paul Gonzenbach hadn’t decided to relocate to a farm outside of Portland, Ore., shortly after the making of his band’s record.
“I just got tired of trying to live in San Francisco. It became more than I could handle, trying hard to make a living and still falling behind faster. San Francisco’s a really beautiful place but nobody gets to stop and enjoy it. Everybody’s too busy constantly working just to get by,” explained Gonzenbach recently via telephone from his new home.
On the plus side for music listeners, however, dissatisfaction with one’s surroundings always makes great lyrical fodder, and Gonzenbach managed to channel his disenchantment with S.F. into a truly riveting song cycle on Homemade Drugs. Bleak imagery of despair amid urban decay crops up on tunes like “Middle Harbor Road,” with Gonzenbach employing a striking conversational lyrical style that skirts any direct narrative, (“This might be the best that we ever do living in the gap between downtown and the water, filling in the blank spaces, clinging to you, miming through our lives again, sleeping with the lights on again.”)
“Finding the right degree of vagueness in my lyrics is something I’m highly aware of,” said Gonzenbach. “I occasionally try to write more concretely, to really come up with a strong narrative. Unfortunately my talent doesn’t lie there, it doesn’t work. I’m not as interested in the facts anyway. I’m more interested in conveying emotions.”
Far from being a lyric-driven songwriter outfit, however, the JYPU are a thinking man’s rock assault. Gonzenbach’s cutting words are married to lengthy songs that are never afraid to take on epic proportions. The band’s three-pronged guitar attack proves equally adept at working a layered and sedate groove (“3+1,” “Haunted Rooms”) as they are at kicking in the heads of listeners with brute riffage (“A Deep Deep Lake,” “In Focus.”)
Unsurprisingly, given the symbiotic nature of JYPU’s sound, no single member is directly responsible for songwriting. “Usually Frankie (Koeller, bassist) or Noah (Blumberg, guitarist) will come in with a line that we all just work off of,” explained Gonzenabach. “Lyrics and melody are generally the last thing to come into the song.” The resulting work is oddly beautiful, moody guitarscapes that shimmer beautifully one minute, and jar your senses with a crunchy power chord the next.
The interplay of Gonzenbach’s artfully constructed words with the widely varying musical backdrops results in engrossing moments. On tracks like “Double Negative” a propulsive rock rhythm is paired with emotionally resigned lyrics in an intriguingly oppositional manner, the spark of the band’s guitar firepower seemingly seeking to overwhelm the narrator’s depressive acceptance of his circumstances. “I like trying to put in lyrics that don’t seem to fit with the music at all times,” explained Gonzenbach. “‘Double Negative’ is actually for us kind of a bouncy number, so I was very conscious of trying to put in lyrics that contrasted somehow. Having sad songs with sad lyrics just gets too predictable. Having happier music with sad lyrics and trying to figure out how that changes the song’s meaning—to me, that’s more compelling. I don’t think people relate very well to emotions that are completely pure. Almost everyone has mixed emotions all of the time. That’s just the reality of life.”
The Jim Yoshii Pile-Up is a band operating on the far edges of any rock convention; favoring a dynamic approach that easily shrugs off lazy genre tags and an understanding that it’s the gray areas of song structure (mid-tempo ballads veering into full on rockers and all the way back again) and emotion (the fine line between love, hate and confusion) where truly great music always resides.
The Jim Yoshii Pile-Up plays Thurs., Oct. 10 at the 7th St. Entry with Malachi Constant and Kid Vengeance. 8 p.m. $5. 21+. 701 1st Ave. N., Mpls. 612-338-8388.
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