Tonight: listenlisten Releases "Hymns From Rhodesia" (+ Video)

While I twiddle my thumbs wait for InMotion to get back to me on my support ticket, I figure it’s way, way past time for me to mention a second awesome-sounding show that’s going on this evening…

Some might remember that way back in May or so, yours truly did a little writeup on the then-forthcoming album from one of my absolute favorite bands in this city (or, hell, any other city, for that matter), listenlisten, Hymns From Rhodesia. The band sent me the songs from the album like a month before that, so at the time I was feeling way, way, way late in reviewing it…except that then the album didn’t materialize. Whoops.

As of tonight, however (again, Friday, September 18th, all you non-calendar-havin’ punks), that’s finally going to be remedied. Tonight the listenlisten boys are having their official release party for Hymns up at Mango’s — which I hear now has a renovated/elevated stage, so us poor suckers stuck in the back can actuall see; woo! — closing out the night after openers Peter and the Wolf, I am Mesmer, & Sew What. Things should start at 9PM or so, and while I dunno what the cover’ll be, odds are it’ll be cheap.

I’m also not sure, btw, if the CDs themselves will be available for sale — the “official” date for their release is apparently 9/22, so the show’s a few days early… Either way, though, this show will be downright amazing, I absolutely guarantee it. listenlisten are so utterly, freakishly unique that I honestly have a hard time describing ’em musically; it almost works better to describe ’em, well, chronologically, if you will.

They sound, at least to me, like the music my great-great-grandparents might’ve heard growing up in the backwoodsy parts of this country, or maybe like the music Civil War-era soldiers might’ve listened to as they drowned their sorrows between bloody, pointless battles against their former neighbors. It’s music that’s timeless, yet seemingly out-of-time, if that makes any sense at all. The band plays murky, somber, bleak, intricate music about death, life, and the struggles in-between, all on instruments that sound like they’ve been hanging in the closet of some Appalachian cabin for the past 80 years or so. Think Murder by Death without the kitsch, or The Black Heart Procession with more words, or contemporary folks like The Builders and the Butchers (with whom listenlisten really need to play a show, and soon — prod, prod), and you’ll be close to the strange territory these guys have staked out for themselves.

On CD, the band’s incredibly good, but live, they up the ante further, coming off almost like some kind of fire-and-brimstone tent revival gone horribly awry. The last time I saw them, at the most recent Free Press Block Party, Ben Godfrey, Shane Patrick, & Marshall Graves all stood in a line at the front of the stage as the last remaining sunlight faded away, pounding away at their instruments, eyes closed and howling out the end of a turbulent, raw-nerves-exposed song like they were the only people for miles and miles around. I literally couldn’t look away.

And hey, the openers are very much worth checking out, too — Austin’s Peter and the Wolf play great, crazy, reality-shifted, apocalyptically-tinged indie-folk, I hear I am Mesmer are amazing (and the band seems to grow every time I hear about it), and Sew What‘s quirky, half tongue-in-cheek (I think?) folkiness is always fun to see/hear.

Added bonus time: listenlisten recently released the first video from Hymns From Rhodesia, from the slow-moving, methodical track “On The Water,” and it’s appropriately weird, atmospheric, and creepy as hell. Check it out:

Oh, and for the true diehards (or the people who can’t make it out on a Friday night, which may well include me), you can also catch listenlisten tomorrow, Saturday, September 19th, over at Cactus Music at 1PM. They’ll be playing a free(!) CD release show there, which should also be well worth seeing.

If you want more details on these guys, I interviewed ’em back in February of last year — check that here — or, for more up-to-date info, you can check out a nicely-written interview the Houston Press‘s Chris Gray did with the band over here.

Seriously, I just can’t stress enough how utterly spellbinding these guys are. They’re one of those bands that make me want to burn a bunch of mix CDs and then blast them out to everyone I know so they, too, can listen in awe.