Milwaukee’s
Longacre follows last year’s full-length debut with five songs that further
their adult alt aesthetic. Adding to the group’s muscularly hushed emotional
vignettes are more exotic, international sounds and themes. Some flamenco
guitar and American-Indian powwow drumming form the bass for a couple of cuts;
the opener casts Asian concubinage as a metaphor for alienation and recalls
10,000 Maniacs and Siouxsie & The Banshees. The emotional gravitas that
singer/lyricist Claire Chin brought to her quintet’s 2008 release remains,
though one may wish she’d crack an intermittent smile.
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