Punch Brothers – Antifogmatic

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Take Radiohead, throw them in a room with typical bluegrass instruments (banjo, mandolin, fiddle, etc) and imagine what sounds would come out of that room. You imagining? Probably not too bad, right?.

Now take Radiohead out of that room and throw in 5 guys who actually know what the fuck they’re doing with those instruments, yet have the same brilliant experimental nature of Radiohead.

You are now listening to the Punch Brothers.

The Punch Brothers instrumentation leads you to believe they are a typical bluegrass group. They definitely are not. I’m not even going to try and wrap a genre around them or come up with some fancy name to describe their sound. That would be doing a great disservice to the music they make.

I first heard of these guys by a random visit to Largo in LA. I went to see Jon Brion put on his usual Friday night show but after that was finished, a lucky 50 or so of us got to head into the The Little Room to catch more late night music. The crowd was expecting more Jon and Fiona, but in marched a group of guys with acoustic cases and headed right up to the stage to unpack.

The rest of the night was a gorgeous blur of the most amazing music I had heard in years.

Come to find out they were out in LA recording their latest release “Antifogmatic”. I didn’t make the connection as to why Jon Brion was sitting in the crowd hooting, hollering and calling out songs for them to play. Months pass and I come to find out he was producing, engineering, and mixing the album. Good lord I couldn’t have become more excited for the release.

“Antifogmatic” is perfection from start to finish.

My Radiohead reference that began this is perfectly shown on the track “Me and Us”. You are taken on a 6:02 trip through creepiness and dissonance that brings your mind to a new place. The dynamics are perfect and the violin line Gabe Witcher plays screams modern music, nothing stemming from bluegrass roots.

“Alex” was the first single released from the record for download and for good reason. It takes you from an intimate moment with Chris Thile and his mandolin into rocking hooks backed by great vocals from the rest of the Brothers.

If you are looking for lo-fi indie with gritty drums, move along. If you want to hear some of the most intelligent, pleasing music to your ears that you can get your hands on today,  make a stop here.

Jon Brion’s contributions seemed like they were huge yet also minimal. Give this band one mic and their instruments and they will blow you away. What Brion did was excel the group into an orgasmic experience of acoustic sonic glory.

Check out the EPK of “Antifogmatic” to see what I’m talking about:

You can clearly tell I am very into this release by the Punch Brothers. Here’s the track “Alex” you can get from their website or listen to it here. Definitely consider picking up the full record and look out for it coming to vinyl very soon. I know I’ll be grabbing my copy.

Punch Brothers – Alex