Ever since My Bloody Valentine there have been no shortage of bands choosing to wallop our ears with washes of noisy guitars while teasing those same ears with muffled vocals, but not enough of them--either in the original shoegaze era or in its current "neo" phase--have bothered mixing a strong melody into the sonic assault. The duo calling themselves Ceremony, on the other hand, while making themselves inaccessible Googlistically speaking, have decided to put the "pop" back into noise pop.
Springing from the same Fredericksburg, Virginia trio--Skywave--that ended up giving birth to NYC's A Place to Bury Strangers, Ceremony are loud, no question. But right away see how they take the noisy, rapid-fire beat and use it to as a framework for a melody both leisurely and tuneful. The first hint we get is the lilting--in fact, rather Cure-like--instrumental theme that emerges from the beat at 0:16. That's an ear-friendly hook before the singing even starts. The vocals, when they arrive, are buzzy but not buried; you can not only understand a good number of words, but the singer--either Paul Baker or John Fedowitz (both are listed with the exact same credits: vocal, guitar, bass, drum machine)--sings like he wants to be heard; he's got a portentous baritone, but he enunciates, while singing a catchy little tune when all is said and done. Rather audacious of him, especially on a song with this straightforward refrain: "Take my heart and my life/'Cause someday you'll be my wife." Borrowing a bit from a recent post by Michael Azzerad, one might argue that in a loud and angry age such as ours, using this particular aural toolbox to deliver an unironic, non-violent message of love and connection is more subversive than any effort to be just noisy.
"Someday" was released on a 7-inch single in January, and will appear on Ceremony's
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