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Look beyond the steely skyscrapers jutting into Chicago's grey sky, past the potholed streets and shadowed alleys, and you might be able to
find something beautiful in this scuffed-up metropolis. Something like a cornflower pushing through a cracked sidewalk, struggling its way
toward sunshine. Or the sun glinting off choppy lake waves at dusk. Or the sounds of Chin Up Chin Up, whose disarmingly resonant debut album
We Should Have Never Lived Like We Were Skyscrapers is ready to carry you through autumn and beyond.
The band's history reaches back to 2001, when Jeremy Bolen and Nathan Snydacker formed Chin Up Chin Up (think optimism and perseverance, not
exercise). The two guitarists were joined shortly thereafter by percussionist Chris Dye and bassist Chris Saathoff. In January 2002, the band
released a self-titled EP, which inspired MOJO's call for readers to "meet your new favourite Chicago art-pop band." Later joined by
keyboard player Greg Sharp, Chin Up Chin Up toured extensively, playing shows with the likes of the Appleseed Cast, the Mercury Program, Pedro
the Lion, the American Analog Set, Broken Social Scene, Smog, and Pinback.
Sadly midway through writing their debut full lenght, We Should Have Never Lived Like We Were Skyscrapers, hours, in fact, after mixing
the demos, the band faced a tragic loss. In February 2004, bassist Chris Saathoff was walking home from a show at the Empty Bottle when he was
struck and killed in a hit-and-run accident. For months thereafter, the rest of the band mourned the loss of their good friend. "We all hung
out together more than we hung out as a band," Bolen recalls. "We didn't think about music for a long time." In due time, Chin Up Chin Up
decided to regroup and finish the record. Using three discs' worth of practices that the band had recorded over the last few years, they
pieced together the record's final six songs, keeping Chris's bass lines as intact as possible.
Now on the cusp of the release of their self-titled record by hoometown label Flameshovel, the band revisits the various elements that had
brought them together in the first place. Says Bolen, "I guess we started the band trying to do something that was not like lots of the music
happening in the Midwest. We love Chicagom but really wanted to step out of our math-rock past into something more pop," adding, "I don't
think we succeed at that exactly per se, but in our minds at least we wanted to make songs people could sing along to, rather than trying to
be as musically complicated as possible."
The end result aptly demonstrates that duality as lifting riffs play against a crescendoed bounce, Bolen's hopeful yelp calls out, "there's a
fault line between us and it's all that keeps us stationary, so let's go, let's go, let's got." And at the end of the day Chin Up Chin Up
makes music about hope, about persevering through tragedy, and the redemption of optimism. Listen and you'll discover the beauty of old souls
dancing like adolescents, their hearts bruised but beating stronger and louder each day.
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Pitchfork Media 7.6 of 10 "Chin Up Chin Up's sound owes much to artisits like 90 Day Men, June of 44, Slint, and Tortoise; the album's
busy guitar parts, xylophones, and unwieldy song titles all scream math-rock. Yet on this record, the band sound like they're growing out of
and and beyond that scene. - Jason Crock
http://www.pitchforkmedia.com/record-reviews/c/index.shtml#chin-up-chin-up
VICE MAGAZINE 7.5 of 10 "...I never 'got' math rock either. It was just too much for me, and sure it was pretty cool, but I couldn't
understand why. Chin Up Chin Up are math rock for people like me... I love [this album]." -Broccolli McEggplant
http://www.viceland.com/music/reviews/chin.php
MOJO "Meet your new favourite Chicago art-pop band."
Fluxblog "...sounds as though it is angling to make it onto the soundtrack of an episode of The OC. (Preferably the inevitable episode
in which Seth and Summer get back together.)"
http://fluxblog.org/2004_12_08_newflux_archive.html
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Right Click on Image and Select "Save link..." to download 300dpi photos
Photos by Martha Williams & MUST be credited
Copyright 2005 Flameshovel Records
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We Should Have Never Lived Like We Were Skyscrapers
(DIG022)
Released 10.26.05
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S/T EP
(DIG025)
Released 08.09.05
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This Harness Can't Ride Anything
(DIG040) LP ONLY
Released 10.17.06
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