Public Strain

So no, Public Strain isn’t the manic, dirty opus Women was. But it’s still Women. And I’m still in love with it.

The group's sophomore effort, Public Strain, pushes forward in both directions-- the hooks are noisier, the noise is hookier, and both are fogged over with enough reverb to make Felt records seem bone-dry by comparison.

Yes, it’s fine to use the same methods Mr. Reed implemented, but to dole out several minutes of junk noise doesn’t make you seem unique, clever, or even like students of the game; it makes you sound pretentious.

Women, a band inevitably consisting entirely of men and hailing from Calgary, fall into this latter, perhaps more radical, camp - combining the melodic and symphonic characteristics of a group remembered for their highly sophisticated symphonic pop with the deliberately sketchy, sometimes abrasive sound of lo-fi recording techniques. At times on their second album, Public Strain, Women seem to have made some further steps towards integrating the two halves of their sound, but their predominant characteristic is a kind of wilful disruption.

I’ve owned Women’s second album for a couple of months now, and while I’ve listen to Public Strain all the way through on a more than purely professional number of occasions, I’m going to have to be honest and say that closing song ‘Eyesore’ has completely distracted me. Good old last.fm suggests that I’ve listened to it via electronic means a solid 29 times, a figure I know to be a gross understatement (but why won’t it scrobble, eh?). It’s a song that has so mercilessly, ungratefully, dare I say cuntishly colonised my day-to-day thoughts that it’s pretty comprehensively thrown off my entire perception of this record. As a result I probably shouldn’t even be writing about Public Strain as a while, but y’know, here we go...