They don't have any new albums out, just some old ones that have kept growing on me over the years. For what my opinion is worth, I think they're one of the most underappreciated bands around.
All Music Guide, Pitchfork, and just about everyone else have all compared Joe Pernice's voice to that of Colin Blunstone of The Zombies. (Usually the word "smoky" is used.) The comparison is inevitable and apt. The similarity owes less to imitation, I would like to think, than to natural ability. Both singers possess voices that sound more fragile than they really are. Their vocals are whispery but not breathy: these guys are actually singing. It's the kind of sound that won't often work for the heavy stuff--It's worth noting that 2006's Live a Little includes a song about The Clash, but The Pernice Brothers seem unlikely to be able to actually pull off a Clash cover. There's a bit of that that Clash influence there, but for the most part The Pernice Brothers' specialty is intelligent pop music for a literate adult audience--music that is geared for the kind of listener who has been around the block a few times and is perhaps sadder but wiser for it.
Joe Pernice's lyrics prove that he possesses a great ear for the sound of words, and for the most part he avoids cliches and goes instead for more original figures of speech and, quite frequently, clever, sardonic wordplay. Pernice is also also a writer of short stories, and his gift for character sketch translates into his lyrics, as in this example from "Cruelty to Animals":
She won't mind if the place we stand is marked by ash. She believes what
doesn't kill her only takes more time to kill her. Then she smiles as she
paints her lips and does her lashes. Stunning as a taxidermy victim in a
silver cage.
The images and clever turns, startlingly good for pop music, continue: "Stuck in dumn amazement like a dog who's told to levitate." "... spinning glue back into horses."
It's true that musically there is nothing revolutionary or bold about his songs, and in fact some of them in tone and sentiment even border on what we might vilify as "light rock" or "adult contemporary." Don't let that easy tone fool you, though. There is admirable craftsmanship in every track the Pernice Brothers have released, and their work is all the more remarkable considering that it's all indie label material. Thirty years ago, one would think, these guys would have been all over the radio. Video really did kill these would-be radio stars.
So, what the Pernice Brothers offer is exquisitely crafted pop songs: shimmering, incandescent, approaching the sublime sometimes in the way that the best power-pop (The Beatles, Big Star, those Neko Case harmonies on certain New Pornographers tracks) can do. There's a bit of the Zombies, a bit of Elvis Costello, that distant hint of Joe Strummer, even some Squeeze and Joe Jackson, perhaps. The Elvis Costello similarity comes across not in the sound of the vocals but in the phrasing; listen to the way Pernice stretches out words sometimes at the ends of his verses, as in "Somerville," his ode to coming home with your tail tucked between your legs after not making a go of it in the city.
My favorite Pernice Brothers album is 2003's Yours, Mine, and Ours. At a first listen, this album seems a little too slick, perhaps. This is partly due to the opening track, "The Weakest Shade of Blue," which is so well put-together that it seems like something only a machine could produce. You learn to live with its over-perfection, though. For a Pernice Brothers song, "Weakest Shade" has moments that are brimming with optimism. You shouldn't get used to that, because the next track, "Water Ban," and most of the rest of the songs that follow strike more troubled notes. The melancholy tone persists to the end of the album and almost drags it down a little in the end; my only complaint about this set is that it needs another track (in addition to the exquisite "Sometimes I Remember") with a little more drive in it to hold up the last few songs. Nevertheless, the songs are in and of themselves pitch-perfect. This is an imminently listenable collection of songs. "One Foot in the Grave"--despite its ominous title--strikes the perfect balance between up and down; this is what power-pop is supposed to do. "Blinded by the Stars" and "Waiting for the Universe" are other stand-outs. Although this is the most heavily rotated album on my iPod, I am still waiting to get tired of listening to it.
My next favoriate Pernice Brothers album, 2006's Live a Little, does not quite, to my mind, achieve the same level of the sublime, but it's still a great album by any measure. Thematically, the songs focus mostly once again on mature perspectives on adult relationships. It does boast my favorite Pernice Brothers song, "Lightheaded," a song about celebrity, fame, and all that glitter and flash that have eluded Pernice. If this is the result of obscurity, though, he comes off all the better for it.
It's easy to consider Joe Pernice--voice, lyrics, melodies--as the sole architect of this band's sound, but that would be a mistake. As important as he is, all of this would fall a little flat if it weren't for the music that holds that wispy voice aloft. What really makes the Pernice Brothers such a spectacular band is the band. These aren't stripped down acoustic numbers that we're listening to, and as much as the craft of songwriting is in evidence here, I wouldn't want to listen to these songs presented in a bare-bones singer-songwriter fasion. That's not what they're designed for, though it's true that an acoustic guitar track is put to good use at the heart of most Pernice Brothers songs. The arrangements are pretty lush for indie music--especially given the strings on Live a Little--but they're never over-produced. The songs really achieve definition from Peyton Pinkerton's guitar lines, which never quite jangle, exactly, though they do parse out the contours of Pernice's melodies to great effect. On YM+O, the keyboards--at first almost unnoticeable, a mix of organ and spacey-sounding synthesizer--also add flourishes that would be sorely missed were they not present, and LAL features some steady piano work. I've started to appreciate the drums, too, lately--not just the precision of a well-kept beat but also the fills on "One Foot in the Grave," for instance, or at the end of "Automaton," which serve as a reminder that, despite the subtlety of the music, this is a rock band we're hearing.
What happens to a band like The Pernice Brothers? They have a sizeable following for a band that releases on its own label, but mainstream commercial success in today's music industry climate seems well-nigh impossible. At this point, I imagine, every record sale counts, so my recommendation is to get out there and buy a Pernice Brothers record first chance you get.
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