Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday
(Sub Pop/Stomp)
The crooked note on the cover says it all. In the outsider-pop tradition of the Vaselines and more recently Girls, Vermont USA trio Happy Birthday have emerged from nowhere with a dazzling self-titled debut. Well, not entirely from nowhere: singer-guitarist Kyle Thomas previously recorded a promising record called
Was Dead under the solo moniker King Tuff. But where King Tuff felt like a passing outlet for his one-man glam heroics, Happy Birthday is a fully formed – if no less idiosyncratic – creation that has all the makings of a band with legs.
Backed by guitarist-bassist Chris Weisman and drummer Ruth Garbus, each of whom chime in with backing vocals, Thomas turns his bratty vocal squeak loose on bright shards of garage, bubblegum, punk, and psych. The leadoff ‘Girls FM’ is coolly catchy but also crowded with aslant background sounds that lend an surreal haze to the song’s plinking pop heart. It’s primitive and sweet in a way that’s at once unique and familiar; one can’t help but read ‘Cracked’ as a reference to the Modern Lovers’ ‘She Cracked’, and singing cartoonish lyrics about brain damage over muddy riffs can only recall the Ramones. There are even grotesque, Daniel Johnston-esque drawings throughout the album booklet.
Unlikely though it may seem, this album is a wondrous headphones listen. It’s roughly coded as lo-fi, but finesses a continuous spray of unforeseen details worth absorbing at the closest possible range. There’s also a deceptive breadth to these songs: Thomas follows the garishly sexual ‘Perverted Girl’ with the genuinely romantic ‘Subliminal Messages’ and the splintered teen fantasy of ‘Eyes Music’. No matter the approach and despite the dream-world lyrics, there’s often a simple love (or at least lust) story at work. On the harmonies-guided ‘Maxine The Teenage Eskimo’, Thomas downplays the song’s offbeat premise with the declaration “She was unlike any other girl.”
Best of all is ‘Zit’, a snotty anthem that’s gloriously and stupidly fun. Mentioning his teens and 20s in passing, Thomas nails the frustrated, directionless energy of youth with a fist-pumping chorus:
“Now I wanna break shit / Don’t wanna make shit / Just wanna waste it yeah.” A whole record of songs just like that would have been welcome. But then we’d miss out on something like the closing ‘Fun’, an affecting ballad that shows how easily Thomas can instill straightforward sentiments with much dreamy depth. He knows what it’s like to be young, creative, yet stuck, and this album is the best escape valve one could imagine.
Doug Wallen
Happy Birthday - 'Subliminal Message'
myspace.com/brattleborohousecartoon