Review Summary: The debut EP by Mike from Stranger Thing's band is in no way a bad listen, but neither is it impressive enough to merit anything more than a casually curious couple of spins.
In the performing art world, cross-disciplinary success is a puzzling yet very white whale. While there
have been artists who have proven it is possible to be good at more than one thing (hi, Dwayne Johnson), more often than not, artists seeking to cross over into another discipline find themselves struggling to be taken seriously.
This is particularly true of actors seeking to cross over into the music world. One might think that being a talented performer with an established fan base would help the transition effort, rather than hinder it, but the handful of examples at hand speak otherwise; in fact, with the notable exception of Jared Leto (arguably better known nowadays as a musician than as an actor) it is virtually impossible to name a film or television star who has managed to achieve success in the recording world. Actor-fronted musical acts not named 30 Seconds to Mars tend to be, at best, unremarkable, and at worst, deserving of the derision they receive; textbook examples of this phenomenon include Dogstar, Juliette and the Licks or this review's subject, Calpurnia.
Founded and fronted by Finn Wolfhard (better known to the public for playing lead geek Mike in smash-hit Netflix series
Stranger Things), Calpurnia are the latest (and youngest) to join the ranks of failed musical projects by otherwise popular actors; for even Wolfhard's star power (at the height of his breakthrough show's popularity, no less) was powerless to keep these indie-rockers alive past their introductory telease. A mere two years after having formed, Calpurnia quietly disbanded, leaving one EP, eight original songs and a handful of covers - less than one hour of music in total - as their sole legacy. Not the shortest career to ever have been enjoyed by a newcomer band, to be sure, but still – one might have expected a band led by one of the biggest modern-day teen heartthrobs to go just a bit further than that.
To make matters worse, Calpurnia are not even a
bad act; in fact, they fall squarely on the 'unremarkable' side of the actor band scale.
Scout, their single EP release, is not going to change anybody's world (especially anybody who has ever listened to an indie-rock band) but it makes for a pleasant and eminently replayable 23-odd minutes, which already puts it a cut above any effort by the likes of Dogstar. This fact is especially remarkable considering all four of Calpurnia's members were in their mid-teens at the time of this release – a fact which also leads to some leniency when assessing their output.
Still, there
are some flaws about
Scout which are hard to overlook, the main one of which is the horrid production job. Like any indie band worth its salt, the Canadians absolutely drench their sound in reverb, presumably in an attempt to achieve a sort of artificially lo-fi effect. Like most artificial substitutes to a real component, however, the tactic never really works;
Scout sounds less retro-vintage and more as though it is being played back through one of those hollow toy microphones that bounce sound around to create an echo. Even more offendingly, however, the mix puts far too much emphasis on the trebles, while Jack Anderson's bass sound comes across as thin, tinny and lost in the mix; as a result, the final product is thin
as well as hollow-sounding, which ends up hindering the listener's impression of the album as a whole.
Shoddy production can, however, be overcome by genuinely good songs, and here Calpurnia almost manage to make up for the terrible sound –
almost. The majority of the six songs on
Scout is decidedly not-bad-at-all, but very seldom do the group really manage to assert themselves as a force to be reckoned with – possibly because they are too busy attempting to be someone else.
In fact, Wolfhard and Co. are not shy about wearing their influences on their sleeve, and it takes no more than a few seconds of opening track
Louie to suss out the main one. As soon as Wolfhard's deliberately off-key vocals come in on opener
Louie, the listener is struck with an unshakeable realisation –
Mike from Stranger Things is trying to be Lou Reed. All the telltale signs are there – the vocal tics, the inflections, the diction, even the aforementioned dissonance hark back to the New York native. Further cementing this impression is the backing musical track, a melancholy, jingly-jangly indie-rock mid-tempo which would not have sounded out of place on Reed's main band's magnum opus,
Andy Warhol. Sadly for Wolfhard, he is nowhere near as competent a singer as his idol – or his
other inspiration, the Pixies' Frank Black – and his pre-pubescent, almost-in-key falsetto often comes across as grating rather than endearing.
Fortunately, subsequent tracks do a lot to mitigate this poor first impression. Second track and first standout
Wasting Time shows that, when they are not preoccupied with being Junior Velvet, Calpurnia actually do rock, while third track
Greyhound or closer
Waves show the band are more than capable to write moody, melancholy indie-rock songs while also retaining their originality.
Still, for all their efforts to stand on their own, Calpurnia are not entirely able to resist taking cues from their favourite bands - other than the pervading Velvet Underground influence, lead single
City Boy cribs vocal harmonies from both Garbage's
Stupid Girl and AIR's
Sexy Boy. Presumably, Wolfhard has never learned that it is a bad idea for any piece of media to evoke others better than itself...
Another potential sticking point for listeners beyond their teens (and not taken by Finn's boyish charms) are Calpurnia's lyrics; while by no means offensive, they do hinge on the sort of themes, messages and lines that seem incredibly deep when one is in their teens – and incredibly embarrassing a mere few years thence. The most glaring example of this is
City Boy's chorus, where Wolfhard laments the fact that his unrequited crush dates
'the city tool', all while keeping a perfectly straight face. Fortunately, nothing else on
Scout is even remotely as cringe-worthy as that moment, but the fact remains – Calpurnia is a band
by teenagers and mostly
for teenagers. Judging by the volume of the shrieks heard during the group's live performances, however, both they and their fanbase are perfectly okay with that.
In the end, then,
Scout is neither better nor worse than a thousand other indie-rock debut EP's littering the likes of Bandcamp; the only factor setting Calpurnia aside from these more anonymous bands is the presence of a rising movie and television star in their ranks. The Canadians' debut effort is in no way a bad listen, but neither is it impressive enough to merit anything more than a casually curious couple of spins. In fact, the most lasting feeling it evokes is one of irony – in this case, derived from the fact that the best song Calpurnia ever recorded (infectious rocker
Cell) is also the only one not to be present on their debut...
Recommended Track
Wasting Time
City Boy
Waves
