NW Noise Reviews
Daytime Volume - The Day We Transposed
MP3 of Traverse City
trans·pose [v. trans-pohz; n. trans-pohz]
1.to change the relative position, order, or sequence of; cause to change places; interchange.
Daytime Volume’s first full length EP, The Day We Transposed, was released on January 23rd, 2007 on Expunged Records. Daytime Volume is Jared Myers, Mike Beaton, Pat Bayliss, and Matthew Morgan. If you recognize Matthew’s name it’s because he’s an accomplished music producer and member of Blue Skies for Black Hearts, also from Portland.
I found The Day We Transposed to be folksy, moody and the sounds I’d expect to hear at a local coffee shop. The first half of the album sounds like a warm-up, a building that’s being built to showcase the latter songs. The track I most enjoy on the album is Traverse City, it has a sing-along, strong-acoustic-strumb sound behind the singing of Jared Myers; about half-way through the song the monotonous acoustic regiment is transformed by a wondrously melodic keyboard fill that is accompanied by what sounds like a violin.
Back to the first-half of the album, Midwest Stars is a bit to quiet and unvarying with the vocals; the song feels shy and not much more than a little country diddy. Luckily, the next track, solidly returns the pop feel to the album, though you might have a good point stipulating that Trouble Beyond The Fence sounds too much like a The Decemberists track – specifically, Trouble Beyond The Fence makes me want to listen to My Mother Was a Chinese Trapeze Artist.
In the middle, The Nothing, is a depressing, short song with the defensive lyrics “So that’s right they tried, So that’s right they tried…there’s nothing I can do…”. Matthew’s versatile drumming is on display as he sits back and lays down a light accompaniment with a haunting snare.
Pele’s Grand Finale further exemplifies the idea that some of the better tracks live on the tail-end of The Day We Transposed. The track features lyrics you could sing along with; which feels nice considering it took 10 tracks to get us to the spiritual release of belting a lyric out on the top of your lungs. Lyrics like, “comb your hair and have a drink on me/just don’t leave” and “I can see your disconnection…but it still looks promising/just like the goodbye girlfriends”.
Something To Chase is beautiful; ”...believe it I’m leaving” is a charming way to end a song and the album. I would love if Daytime Volume took the latter songs as inspiration and a starting point for their next release because these songs really showcase the songwriting talent of the collective and their ability to layer a variety of melodic sounds. Great job guys.
Buy The Day We Transposed on iTunes
Buy The Day We Transposed on CDBaby
You may also be interested in...Comments
Commenting is closed for this article.
