Stretched Like A Nylon Wire

Field Music "A New Town"

The Brewis brothers of Field Music are masters of stoic, tightly composed formalist rock. Their melodic sensibility is clearly derived from Paul McCartney (and his various musical progeny), but they replace McCartney's loose ease with OCD rigidity. This could be a recipe for musical disaster, but they own it - it always sounds like a very honest expression of a particular sensibility. "A New Town," from their forthcoming album Plumb, breaks little ground for the band - well, unless you want to focus on the inclusion of odd bubble sound effects – but it's an example of the band at their best, when their precise, meticulous execution of layered rhythms and melodies serves to illustrate the mindset of the lyrics, which approach the dissolution of a relationship with an almost ridiculous degree of forced rationality in a highly emotional situation. Pre-order it from Amazon.