Tyvek : Fast Metabolism
Let us, for a moment, consider a seemingly simple, yet strikingly perplexing equation that strains the mind to such tension when pondered over that your first ever migraine is guaranteed to last much longer than the 23 minutes it takes to listen to this album. Take the logic crushing, speed-of-light greatness of Wire and filter it through the minds of the kinds of American kids that would listen to Wire, and see how awesome it sounds. These are not what one would call “punks” per se. Sure they’re acned to hell like punks and they’re sure as shit as rabble-rousing, but these characters spend day in and day out having scattered dialogues with a strong vocabulary and near-nonsensical wit, scribbling notions of social theory, lovelorn rants and political screeds around margin doodles. Put this in the vicinity of rock instruments in an atmosphere of constant boredom and magic simply…occurs.
Maybe that’s a tad volcanic to describe a band that writes songs of a particular quirkiness and intellect that is peculiar in both hipster and punk crowds. But a band must get the highest of commendations for venturing into the forbidden tundra of music that actually keeps my interest and quite possibly more than a handful of others. For a while I thought that intelligence and youth had become mutually exclusive in the modern age. For the longest time I’ve been stifled by the “art” scene and their flirtations with psuedo-high art and blue collar kitsch in which a simple riff cannot be played without a misguided tinge of irony and insincerity. A good percentage of Tyvek is riddled in a pleasant arrested development of youth.
In addition, it’s not hard to look in wonder of the genius of a title like Fast Metabolism, it fits the album’s heart and soul like a pair of vinegar-boiled jeans. The album is actually a combination of their EP Summer Burns—the first four tracks—and various odd and ends available on iTunes. Nevertheless, put together, these songs are consistent infections of unbound energy delivered with both swiftness as well as precision and they’re easily digested. These are diverse offerings however. Some songs are put together with wry, jagged hooks that shoot off in bratty irritability. Others are just as tense but Tyvek don’t shy away from the occasional sandpaper groove of melodic punk. Lyrics are quirky and absurd proposing provocative, existential questions like, “Can you drive a Honda like I can drive a Honda?” that certainly have the power to open a listener’s eyes to a new spatial consciousness that spirals straight from dead air.
Considering that these guys have little time to tour as a result of having regular jobs (one being an ADA for the city of Detroit), they make the best of their studio time. There’s a fluidity to all of these songs as of they’re being played as a well-tuned live set. They simply function as proper artistic mechanisms sending signals of good times and childish pep to hold down our twenty-something conservatism and let loose for five fucking minutes or until question mark.
Similar Albums:
Wire – Pink Flag
Wipers – Youth of America
Wooden Shjips – Wooden Shjips
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