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Brooklyn freak-folk collective unleashes its latest curiosity from the creative edge
I caught Akron/Family’s supposedly “legendary” live gig at Emo’s during last year’s SXSW festival, and they were the single-worst live act I’d witnessed in the past decade—shambolic, deliberately bad, parked at the bleeding edge of where performance art meets outright incompetence.
Which makes the trio’s fifth full-length all the more puzzling. On one hand, there are elements of what annoyed me so thoroughly about them in the first place: atonal skronk of the Sun Ra/Captain Beefheart variety, both of whom experimented with time/space/anti-melody way more convincingly (it’s impossible to make it through “Everyone is Guilty” and “MBF” without wincing at the sheer amateurism) and “chorale vocals” that make John and Yoko’s most inane moments seem positively inspired by comparison (OMG, how to even interpret “Gravelly Mountains of the Moon?”). But then there are intervals such as “Sun Will Shine” and “Many Ghosts,” which amaze with their ability to delicately dance along the continuum between the Grateful Dead’s more pastoral, American Beauty-era material and Pink Floyd’s post-Syd/pre-Dark Side period. “River” and “They Will Appear” even dip into Afro-pop’s rhythmic complexity without tilting toward Vampire Weekend’s polymath pretensions. What emerges from Set ’em Wild, Set ’em Free is the realization that Akron/Family is maddeningly unknowable and, essentially, a product of all these influences rolled up into one gigantic, take-it-or-leave-it stringball.
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I sincerely believe that this is one of the strongest record of the year (which is a bold statement with MPP, Veckatimest, Bitte Orca, Bromst, Sometimes I Wish I Were an Eagle, Beware, etc.).
You're clearly basing your opinion of this band on a bad live show you saw a year ago. Talk about "amateurism".....
Corey Dubrowa
1.) i hope you did this as a college credit because if you received payment for this....you are everything that is currently wrong with the music business as a whole
2.) the only reason i read this is because a fellow colleague in the business told me that Paste wrote the most asinine review..at least when pitchfork writes a review such as yours it has merit and holds true to people who actually know music and art for that matter.
3.) i think perhaps you should keep your college writing skills up by writing about music that is a little more surfaced for your mind.
its really hard to believe ..."Corey duBrowa brings 20 years of experience in corporate communications, journalism, "
stick to the corporate world its suites you
i have to agree with the comments. this is one of the best so far this year. though i've gotta skip over MBF as the repetitive noise is a bit much toward the end. but as a whole, this record is great.
'it suites you'
You get free housing for your writing? Sweet. I should get into this corporate world I keep hearing so much about.