No Age - Everything In Between
- Written by Greg Salter
No Age’s trajectory seems like the familiar ‘band story’, but with your finger on fast forward. Formed in late 2005, the band experimented and formed the basis of their sound in their local scene through 2006 (admittedly, their local scene is based around LA’s The Smell, whose influence and other bands have since spread across the globe – thanks Internet!), released and then compiled early EPs on Weirdo Rippers in 2007, dappled in a higher fidelity with their acclaimed debut Nouns in 2008, before looking to the future with a new EP, Losing Feeling, last year. No Age’s work ethic apes their songs – short, sharp, to the point, and unlikely to look back.
In fact, Losing Feeling seems to have performed its role as ‘stopgap EP’ well – while certainly not a departure for the band, its 50/50 split of reflective, ambient tracks with more ferocious bursts of melodic noise predicts the greater attention to atmosphere and texture on No Age’s new record, Everything In Between. Vocal-less, ambient tracks such as ‘Katerpillar’ and ‘Dusted’ puncture the noise, while samples and cut-and-pasted percussion and feedback offer ambiguous new dimensions. For example, the thumping percussive intro to ‘Life Prowler’ could either be sinisterly sadistic or mind-numbingly repetitive, depending on your outlook – the sqwarling guitars would suggest the former, while the duo’s rather flat, defeated vocals hint at the latter.
And these vocals are at the forefront of No Age’s sound more than ever on Everything In Between and, more often than not, they address a kind of jaded journey, with the fuzz of drowsy passages suddenly lifted by violent caffeinated jolts. Some of the themes are even not dissimilar to those of bands like The Dismemberment Plan – though while that band’s wordy ruminations seemed rooted in East Coast cities, it’s the drifting landscape and searing highways of LA that form the backdrop for No Age’s much vaguer reflections. Certainly though, there’s a greater lyrical complexity being, very quietly, ushered in on this record.
One thing that critics will fall over themselves to stress with Everything In Between is the ‘pop’ elements of these songs – while this is stating the obvious to some extent (No Age have always written pop songs, surely?), it does sound, more than ever, like the band are lifting the cloak of noise away to reveal the big pop-song-shaped package that they’ve been concealing the whole time. ‘Fever Dreaming’ stands out, with it’s frantic, melodic verses interrupted by shards of noise that may momentarily knock you sideways, but won’t wipe the stupid grin off your face. ‘Depletion’ pulls off the old trick of dressing up a sad song in bright, noisy clothes while ‘Common Heat’ follows with no pretences – it’s an unexpected, reflective moment on the record’s first half.
While Everything In Between lacks the surprise punch of Nouns, it is arguably more consistent and boasts greater sonic variation. In retrospect, Nouns may have been slightly overrated (it can be tempting to champion a band perceived to be at the head of a scene, particularly one that is considered so important and makes apparent its ideological connections to similar, influential scenes from the late ‘80s), but here No Age make good on their promise and keep hold of the experimental ethic that carried them through their early, DIY days. That they manage to do all this and provide songs as instantly memorable as ‘Fever Dreaming’, the scorched ‘Valley Hump Crash’, the cannibalistic ‘Skinned’ and the shimmering, though sharp, ‘Glitter’ is remarkable.