SCHOONER

Schooner are a great Chapel Hill band. Here is a great song by them, called "Indian Sunburn." It is off of a new 4 band split cd put out by Pox World Empire called 3X4. The other bands--Erie Choir, The Sames and Summer Set--are also great and it is worth checking out. Here is another great song of thiers: "Stunts, Showmanship and Codes."

Trying to say what makes Schooner so good is difficult. At first they seem good, but fairly normal, but after a while you notice that there is something lurking below the surface: similar to, say, an early Sebadoh song--it is simple and beautiful and seems, at first, sweet, but after a while you sense the sour below the surface. Live, this really comes through. They could be the most crowd pleasing band in the world--and I use this phrase as a negative, meaning, pandering to the crowd, playing it easy, going soft--but there is a subtle oddness, a strain in them that resists. It is hard to describe: Like an attractive kid in school who grows his hair long to hide it; a beautiful girl who wears clothes to large to hide herself. They could just strum and strum and make us sing, but they stop half-way through the song, put their hand over the mic and wait until the good feeling has passed.

This is a very good thing.