Most Popular
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Perez Hilton Picks a Fight
Haters and lawsuits threaten Miami's infamous celebrity gossip export.
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The Murder of Master Do
Ten murders and Haitian gangs roil the quiet town of North Miami.
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A Felony with That Croqueta?
Criminals are everywhere at the nation's best-known Cuban eatery.
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Lambs to Slaughter
Miami's Catholic leaders covered for a priest who drugged and sodomized at least a dozen boys.
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Che Guevara Who?
Cubans get pissed, an artist gets even, and the supreme prosecutor of the Cuban revolution gets booted from Dadeland.
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Shirley Q. Liquor's Racist Scum (23)
Ban ugliness from Miami Beach.
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A Pregnant Pause (12)
Drink heavily and don't worry. That baby will be fine.
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Carbonell Cold Shoulder (8)
We're all losers at South Florida's biggest awards show.
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Sour Milk (7)
Tennessee Williams gets walloped in the Design District.
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The Murder of Master Do (7)
Ten murders and Haitian gangs roil the quiet town of North Miami.
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A Pregnant Pause
Drink heavily and don't worry. That baby will be fine.
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Remaking Michael Jackson
Why waste money on (or steal) those bogus Thriller remixes when you can get better ones legally for free?
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I'm a WMC Survivor
The highlights of this year's Winter Music Conference.
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Kickin' It Old-School
DJ Jazzy Jeff and Biz Markie splash down at the Shelborne Hotel's Sunday pool party.
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Blaze of Glory
Jon Bon Jovi for governor?
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Petty Pedicabbery
01:07PM 04/25/08 -
If You Think We're In A Recession...
10:17AM 04/25/08 -
Weekly News Wrapup - Murdoch Tries To Control The World
08:30AM 04/25/08 -
Last Night: Panic at the Disco and Motion City Soundtrac at the Fillmore
02:38PM 04/25/08 -
Last Night: Bonde Do Rolê at Studio A
08:40AM 04/25/08 -
Cultura Festival 2008 is Looking for Bands
12:20PM 04/24/08
What we are writing about
- Arsht Center
- Bicentennial Park
- Churchill's
- CiFo Art Space
- Coconut Grove
- Coral Gables
- Culture Room
- Design District
- downtown Miami
- Fillmore
- Fort Lauderdale
- Hollywood
- Julia Tuttle Causeway
- Little Haiti
- Little Havana
- Marc Sarnoff
- Miami Art Museum
- Miami Beach
- Miami local art
- Miami local music
- Miami local theater
- PlayStation
- sex offenders
- Studio A
- Tobacco Road
- Ultra Music Festival
- White Room
- Wii
- WMC
- Wynwood
Recent Articles By Nicholas L. Hall
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Dr. Manhattan
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Swan Songs
Murder by Death creates stunning, dark works that transcend the provocative name.
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RBD
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Arturo Sandoval
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Lang Lang
National Features
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The Pitch
Time Bomb in a Bottle
"The idea that you're using sex hormones to make plastic is just totally insane."
By Nadia Pflaum -
Houston Press
Foreclosure Pets
When homeowners are pushed out, animals get left behind.
By Paul Knight -
Broward-Palm Beach New Times
On Your Honor
A judge's alleged relationships with defense lawyers and prosecutors raise eyebrows.
By Bob Norman -
Village Voice
A Soldier's Story
Remembering the day a black mob lynched a white man.
By Tony Ortega
Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
Pershing (Polyvinyl Records)
By Nicholas L. Hall
Published: April 24, 2008
Subject(s): Pershing , Polyvinyl Records, Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin
Usually, overly long band names point to an irritating sense of self-importance. Why else would you make someone spend a full minute enunciating your name, or force your fans to apply some ridiculous acronym? But somehow, by about 15 seconds into "Glue Girls," the lead track from Pershing, it's easily forgiven. Perhaps it's the grin-inducing way the subtle, strummy acoustic intro segues into punchy electric guitar, just fuzzy enough to rough up the otherwise rounded corners. Next up, "Boring Fountain" launches with a bright and engaging horn line, underscored by harpsichordlike guitar.
Lyrically, the band is earnest but not cloying, playful but not precious. Charming and infectious might be good descriptors. Fans of the band's previous, debut effort will find themselves in familiar landscape, with sing-along choruses, handclaps, and whoa! whoa! scat-sung sprinkles providing the basic topography. That doesn't mean the band is mining familiar material to the exclusion of other veins; there is an element of exploration running just under the surface. Most often, it emerges as a bit of Jazzy-with-a-capital-J guitar work, as on "The Beach Song." Elsewhere, the band employs a bit of what one might call rock, welding hunks of bravado onto the sunny and genteel framework of songs such as "Oceanographer." These little flourishes and glints of divergence help transform the album from a passable indie pop record into something with a lot more ambition. The band with the never-ending name might have a similarly lengthy career.
