Last month, we brought you “Roll It” from Nap Eyes’ damn-near-faultless new album, Thought Rock Fish Scale. Today, a few days before the LP’s February 5 release on Paradise of Bachelors, here’s the whole enchilada.
I asked label founder Brendan Greaves what he loved about the Nova Scotia band, and he was dead-on with this summary of their new album’s effect: “It’s an oceanic sound, briny and brisk, that manages both to fully inhabit and to deconstruct guitar pop genres, pinging some favorite coordinates—everything from the spiny duality of the Go-Betweens to the ache of the Only Ones to the minimalist poetry of Robert Lax—without actually sounding very much like anything else. There are times when 'Alaskan Shake' feels like it is a song about everything that matters.”
For my money, Nap Eyes are one of the best rock bands in business today, handily spanning the space between Bob Dylan and The Microphones. Nigel Chapman’s songwriting grips like the best of them. A timeless release, already.
