You have no idea how excited I am to finally be able to tell y’all about this album. Much like the O’Death cd, my expectations were through the roof for this album. However, after the whopper they dropped on us with III I wasn’t even bothering with trying to quell my expectations. Once again, just like the new O’Death, my expectations weren’t just met, they were also met, exceeded, lapped and then chastised for being insultingly low. The amount of ground that this band has covered from The Wall Against Our Back to III to Speaking In Cursive is more than many bands cover in their entire career. The maturity level of their musicianship and Micah’s songwriting is night and day over that 3 album span. There really is no unbiased way for me to talk about this album, I just love it too damned much. I mean, it’s not just Essential Listening, it’s album of the year candidate.
So, there. Now that the gushing is over let’s talk about the disc, but first I wanna disclose that, yes, in two weeks Two Cow is playing my wife’s birthday, but that has no bearing on what I said above. I value ninebullets.net and y’all reading the site way too much to play it like that. If I hadn’t liked the album I just wouldn’t have talked about it at all.
One of the first things about this album that caught my attention was the name. Speaking In Cursive. It’s curious at first and brilliant in context. The title comes from the track, “Bastards and Bridesmaids” and when I heard it in the song I thought, “Fuck! I know that girl! She hangs out at the bar.” and much like Micah (I’d imagine), I avoid her. Another highpoint on the album is “Swingset Assassin”, a song I heard for the first time a few years ago when Two Cow played Tampa. It was first released on a cd-r that Micah and his father released and I was hoping one day it would make it’s way onto a Two Cow disc. Well, it did and it’s great. One of my other favorite tracks on the disc, “Skinny Legged Girl”, is a ridiculously humorous romp through a handful of letters Micah may (or may not) have written to a girl back home that he’s into, who may (or may not) have refuted his affection.
The lack of time between III and Speaking In Cursive suggests that the verse on “No Shame” where he sings of “600 pages of regrets and hundreds of songs I haven’t finished yet” is more reality than hyperbole, and the maturity they are starting to show would suggest that rather than being the “bastard child of Lucero and The Drive-By Truckers”, they are truly becoming a band on par with those guys. I think so. Maybe you will, too. Check out the samples below and the album and lemme know what you think.
Two Cow Garage - Bastards and Bridesmaids
Two Cow Garage - Swingset Assassin
Two Cow Garage - Skinny Legged Girl
Two Cow Garage - No Shame (from III)
Two Cow Garage’s Official Site, Two Cow Garage on myspace, Buy Speaking In Cursive
6 Responses to “TWO COW GARAGE - SPEAKING IN CURSIVE”
On October 22nd, 2008 at 2:26 pm Kelly Said:
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On October 22nd, 2008 at 5:32 pm Brandon Said:
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