Less Pain Forever / H@LO / Custom Deluxe October 14, 2005

Friday Night. Oct. 14, 2005
The Moose
27 E State Street
Doylestown, PA
Info: (215) 348-9135

Less Pain Forever
H@lo
Custom Deluxe

One stands, one sits! Both sing, rock and overextend themselves! It's a simple winning concept that every minimalist duo without a bass player has employed to great personal gain, but few have excelled with greater zeal for multi-tasking and whimsy like James Karnes and Chris Pomerenke. Living on opposite ends of the United States has severely hampered the number of Less Pain Forever shows since 2003 (I count fewer than five, including one show where they didn't actually get to play together at all; Karnes did solo material and Pomerenke cursed out his malfunctioning bass pedal). The decision to give it another go has been bolstered by friend Ryan Page (Moog, Frontier Life) executive-producing the first-ever Less Pain Forever full-length album, recorded with Sonic Youth engineer Aaron Mullan. With 10 years of material to choose from, dating back to their days as Lush Budget Presents the Les Payne Product, the results could be as all-over-the-map as the band itself. But if there was ever a time for what Karnes calls "Phenomerrock," it's now.

http://www.lesspainforever.com/
http://phoenixnewtimes.com/Issues/2005-09-01/music/livewire.html

Uncle Tupelo's family reunion! by: eric lesniewski - moeval productions

Not since 'No Depression' by Uncle Tupelo have I heard songwriting with so much drunken soul. Songs to cry into your beers.

Sean Horan takes H@lo down to your favorite pub in 'Rivertown'. The nasal vocal style here reminding you of all that dirty water running through town. '72' is the singer's 1st shot of liquor, clearing his throat. When it is that Michelle Pulaski joins Sean on 'Even If I Was Sober', you realize that this disc is telling you a story. A man comes into town, drinks himself silly over some memories, meets a sparkling-eyed woman, gets laid and wakes up wondering what the hell it's all about. I'm impressed by the overall production value throughout this disc. Everything is well planned out and the skies' the limit, it seems.

But this is only the first release from this band that I know of.. And I know they've got a cache of songs from their live show.

I'd call this CD release a 'teaser'. It's like the trailer to the movie that's got plenty of Hollywood effects and guitar solo car chases, not to mention 'where is the story going?' but, not able to give it all away. The star-quality appearance of the Reverend Bill bringing it all to an amazing solo peak.

This one stays in the CD player awhile. Plenty of folk put alot of time and effort to make something near perfection.
This is a few pints full of Agrarian country-folk and blues band rock..

Feb-10-2003 9:59 PM