Friday 03.12.10: Echo & Club Underground present SLEEPY SUN / SLANG CHICKENS @ echo

sleepysun

their debut album, Embrace, dispenses its earth-quaking riffage in such carefully measured, perfectly spaced-out rations, it tricks you into thinking the band is much heavier than it actually is.

Their long hair, nature-kid press photos and onstage face paint seemingly align Sleepy Sun with San Fran’s tie-dyed tradition, but the band’s palette is actually smeared with a whole lotta Blacks: Sabbath, Mountain (whose producer, Colin Stewart, works the boards here), Angels and– when singer Bret Constantino busts out a boogie-summoning wail on “Snow Goddess”– even the Crowes. But if the opening “New Age” establishes Sleepy Sun as archetypal stoner-rockers– with Constantino’s vaporous vocals floating atop a subterranean fuzz bassline, molten guitar leads, and drum fills that roll right off of Bill Ward’s tom-tom rack– the song’s follow-up, the surprisingly affecting piano-based spiritual “Lord”, shows the group has designs on writing songs that still move you after the drugs wear off, and that Constantino can be the sort of emotionally assertive vocalist who doesn’t always have to hide behind the haze. – Pitchfork

with:
Slang Chickens || Listen