Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Nerve City-Catholic School


As far as I know Nerve City is the alias of one dude named Jason Boyer from Richmond Virgina.  Nerve City plays lo-fi garage rock with a definite influence from blues and sixties surf music.  I know this probably sounds like fifty other records you have read about this week but I think Nerve City brings enough to this genre to stand out.  One thing I specifically dig about "Catholic School" is although it is only one guy there seems to be a lot of different instruments being played in a lot of different ways.  It seems like a lot of bands misuse the title "lo-fi" or "garage" as an excuse to sound shitty or boring.  The use of less polished recording equipment and technique should be to communicate some of the urgency that the band has live not as a crutch to hide badly written songs.  With that said, Nerve City has plenty of well written songs and no matter what type of recording they are using at the moment they shine through.  On "Catholic School" Boyer fills each song with organ, slide guitar, handclaps and just enough reverb to tie it all together.  Another reason Nerve City stands out is that they haven't released any type of long playing record yet their songs are varied from jangly folk(Dogs) to creepy garage rock(Junkyard).  I will post the now out of print "Catholic School Demo" in its entirety because it is out of print and its the record that got me into them.  Nerve City has plans to release a bunch of stuff in 09 like an LP on Sweet Rot and a few EPs on different labels so keep your eyes open.  


1 comment:

  1. Hey, do you have a copy of this cassette? and are you interested in selling it?

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