UNICYCLE LOVES YOU

Failure

unicyclelovesyou.com

Perhaps intended as film criticism, “Wow Wave Cinema,” the second track on the third album from this Chicago slacker-punk trio, also applies to rock ’n’ roll. “It’s nothing new,” frontman Jim Carroll sings. “It’s just called by a different name.” Twenty years ago, the band’s loveably skuzzy tunes would have been tagged “alt-rock.” Today, they’re “neo-” something-or-other, even though the trifecta of fuzzy guitars, cryptic moping and bubblegum melody has never really gone out of style. Carroll knows his Pixies, Pumpkins and Sonic Youth, but he’s got no reason to apologize for a lack of originality. For ennui (“Piranha”) and scrappy hopefulness (“Garbage Dump”) of this particular variety, there may be no higher form of musical expression.

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