Slumberland Records
The problem of forming a band with wholly contemporary influences is that most often one runs the risk of sounding too similar to other artists still creating music. For the San Francisco-based shoegaze-noise pop trio Weekend a game of utterly transparent “spot the influence” can be played all over the band’s debut LP Sports. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing but it’s what sets Weekend behind other artists working in similar territory such as Women No Age Deerhunter and any number of other groups that have worn out their copies of Psychocandy .
Sports is loaded with high-reverb/low-mix murmur vocals noisy guitars and all the hazy atmospherics that characterize the 2010 indie rock handbook — but that’s exactly the problem. “Monongah WV” for example rides an energetic punk drumbeat but ends up sounding a bit too much like No Age right down to the vocal inflections. And that’s just the start: “Monday Morning” sounds exactly like the ambient side of Cryptograms -era Deerhunter and “Youth Haunts” has a noise guitar tone lifted straight from A Place to Bury Strangers. It all sounds good yet remarkably shallow — Sports is an alright debut and is certainly worth a listen if you’re a fan of contemporary noise-pop (especially if you like it loud as Weekend really delivers in that regard) but unless these guys can set themselves further apart from their influences and peers I can’t reasonably see anyone listening to this album in a year or two.
