Kevin Aldridge will lead his somber band Chatterton off a cliff.
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A D V E R T I S E M E N T
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A D V E R T I S E M E N T
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Chatterton
By Anthony Mariani
We’ve been telling you for awhile about Chatterton, the new project by former Brasco (R.I.P.) frontman Kevin Aldridge. Deep, rich, brooding, and brilliant, the group had been confined to the studio, until recently.
Now with help from the boys in Woodeye, Aldridge’s band is official — and capable of playing live, often, and with great sonic depth. Six guys on stage can make quite a racket. And Aldridge can use every one, to great, haunting effect. A demo of four new Chatterton songs — which wasn’t recorded with the new line-up but still reflects the spirit of the music — reveals a songwriter with a symphonic conductor’s ear for arranging disparate pieces into neat, bleak little tableaux. Jangly guitars, lazily and lightly strummed. Soft and squishy drum beats. Songs in which lone bass tones land like bombs. Aldridge’s voice reaching into falsetto territory, then disappearing like a ghost. Everything moving in the same direction, like a Kubrick film, toward the end of time.
Even the happy songs ring with despair. “Zizi Rear,” with its twinkling six-string and gentle rhythm, begins, “If I had a car / If I had a reason to live / I could drive all night / Then steer it off a cliff.” Yeah, we’re talking midnight-dark stuff. The best thing: Aldridge is wholly believable as sad sack/guy on the window ledge. There’s nothing forced or gratuitous about his sensibility. By comparison, popular black hearts such as Morrissey and Robert Smith probably haven’t had a bad day all this week. Kevin Aldridge has been writing his ass off.
Sat at The Moon, 2911 W Berry St, FW. 817-926-9600.
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